AIBU to think my friend is overdoing emergency stockpiling?

[bagpuss90]

I get that we have been advised to stock up on essentials, though I think it will encourage panic buying. I will probably get a few days worth of stuff at some point . My friend however has, at least in my opinion gone ott about it. She’s stocking up a six month supply of food. She’s bought head torches, a camping gas stove and various other stuff. She thinks I’m being naive …Am I missing something here ?

Huh. Was that their own brand? Or tomatoes generally.

Tomatoes generally.

They did not have any of the plain mid range own brand left and they were low on the economy.

Aldi two minutes away looked fully stocked. Same with Asda. Nothing in it in price.

This obviously says something about Lidl shoppers near me!

I regularly buy for scout camps so this is something I look out for (Aldi and Asda have always had limits on websites but never enforce).

This is the first time I've seen it explicitly on the shelf though. I made a point of looking at other items and it seems to be confined to tomatoes and not other stuff.

Last week someone on MN was saying they had noticed low stock but it was fine here, so I brushed it off as localised.

These signs show that people are definitely taking heed of the government advice and its impacting on sales.

At present there clearly isn't a shortage but it has affected buying patterns - this is an unusual pattern for customers - which Lidl is struggling to keep fully on top of.

That says a LOT of people have gone down the rabbit hole and are taking it seriously.

Yes I do think there are far more people quietly buying extra, they may not be talking about it but it's happening.

Meanwhile in France, have you seen the chaos? School kids (teenagers) rampaging through the cities setting fire to their schools and attacking police because apparently they have 'exhausting timetables', school buildings in poor condition and staff shortages. 400 schools!

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/29/french-students-police-clash-school-blockades-violent

Crickets on the BBC of course.

On the war front -

Russia makes extreme threats against NATO countries over Kaliningrad - nuclear threats. (It's a key region on the Baltic for those who don't know, and is the Russian's Baltic port).

https://www.ft.com/content/1bb7ec8d-7252-4fa3-8c4a-81fa5b6906a2?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Also this is a bit odd

Diesel spillage closes westbound M4!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3ew9wy01k5wo

I don't think the BBC is very reliable. You get a more of a world picture on something like Al-Jazeera if you don't mind feeling utterly miserable afterwards.

I agree, it's not reliable at all. You've got to surf around and even then take it all with a bucket full of salt. It's depressing.

I was always very very pro BBC. It's so depressing to see what it's become in the last couple of years in terms of reliability, speed and editorial decision making.

It's absolutely nuts.

It's very depressing.

Me too, I relied on it. Now I surf around my trusted YT channels and try to get a range of views from different commentators. Not looking forward to YT promoting the BBC as a 'trusted source' in future as has been mooted!

The BBC is still very useful but it's not world leading and it has a growing problem with quality control unfortunately.

I listen to the World Service a lot, R4 a fair bit, watch the News channel not so much.
I still love the BBC; it's a tough gig in the modern world to stay on top.
Steve Rosenberg reporting from Russia is, IMHO, exceptional. Lyse Doucet. Orla Guerin. Gary O'Donoghue. These people are valuable. The BBC as an organisation and institution is another matter but the climate is so changed and so tough.

Way to go undermining their own government's messaging that readiness should be taken seriously. I despair
https://x.com/SkyNews/status/2105622192503325024?s=20

They really are idiots.

Lucy Easthope AT LucyGoBag
Chatter on street is that food security (fancy way of saying do we have food) is top of Burnham’s pile and it needs to be. I have the same frustration as I did in 2019 for pandemic. We need more information on resilience but it is wrapped up in commercial interests

Planning urgently needs to be at national level, place food distribution as part of critical national infrastructure and make a space that the big supermarkets who sell 90% of the food we buy can share the plan for keeping us fed

Airlines manage to share their crisis plans across competing environments without it getting in the way of commercial interests - why can’t food?

The alternative is politically and socially stark. We may run out of food in a sudden shock like volcanic ash or grid failure. And if we do Burnhan, Mahmood, Eagle will look no less negligent/ unwilling to go to difficult places than Johnson and Hancock did

Eyes on this.

Diesel, fertiliser, sulphur shortages on top of a terrible wheat harvest and the two biggest wheat producers Ukraine and Russia beating the shit out of each other means we already KNOW there will be famine around the world next year. Oh and don't forget the small matter of Russian threats.

Interesting to see it is suddenly getting prioritised politically.

We rely on imports of food. There is a problem.

Lucy is not sounding terribly optimistic: "Probably one of the most frustrating aspects of emergency readiness work is that you are ignored until it’s a thing. So the decisions you are left with are so much more limited than if listened to three years before. Food affordability and security is key example"

that will create a stampede

She linked to this blog
https://www.sustainablefoodplaces.org/blogs/feb25-uk-food-resilience/

It starts with this paragraph:
This report outlines critical actions needed to address the UK's food security vulnerabilities and highlights the lack of a robust food resilience plan—something our European neighbours, the USA, and many other nations already have in place.

Let me spell this out.

We don't have a centralised national plan for food if we have a major food crisis in the UK. We do not have a food security plan.

There is some localised planning but this is dependent on your area and since there's no overall strategy they aren't going to be able to magic up food from nowhere if we don't have it.

It stresses the problem with our just in time system on a national basis (this is Lidls tomato problem - it's notable that other shops in the same area aren't having this issue. I suspect this means Lidl system has less flexibility in responding to changes in demand which Asda and Aldi are not experiencing in the same way. It isn't a shortage issue. It's a just in time issue. I don't believe there will be a stampede for this reason because there's not a problem with other stores in sniffing distance).

Eh, don't forget the super record-breaking El Nino, which will plunge some regions into drought, others will have flooding. This map gives some idea of what regions will experience but even then it's not set in stone.

https://www.elninolive.com/impacts

We've already had a hurricane season with no Atlantic hurricanes at all, that's a direct effect of El Nino and a good one, but the Pacific is suffering instead. Wouldn't hurt to stock up on coffee and chocolate if you like it. Wheat, rice and sugar prices will skyrocket. Either crop yields will be lower than usual or crops will be ruined by bad weather. If ever there was a time to get a bit extra in your cupboards, it's now.

I am starting to think seriously that an evacuation bag or at least a list is a very good idea for most people. Not a US style pepper bug out bag, but a plan taking into account medication, documentation, dog lead/ travel pet carriers etc should you ever need to leave in a hurry.
Whatever the fuck that Fairford thing was all about, it seems this would be a good prep for anyone near a base, nuclear power station, chemical factory etc, as well as those who may be affected by floods, wildfires etc.
It's also made me think about more 'ordinary' household preparedness. Decent locks. A fire plan. Fire blankets and fire extinguisher. Installed and checked smoke and carbon monoxide alarms. What3words. Key safe. Actually opening and working out what's what in the first aid kit. Repairing stuff that's a bit dodgy. Ensuring entrances and exits are clear.
That sort of thing.

I agree. I have to slowly persuade DH though. I am doing what I can now. All I can say is the risk of 'something' happening is alarmingly high and there's almost a muting by the most trusted media outlets about these issues and the implications of them which I feel are alarming in their own right. It's a very managed slow drip drip whilst there's a slow accumulation of factors which are very concerning.

I really do think the next couple of years are going to be exceptionally tough one way or another for a great many people who are already saying they are stretched or at breaking point.

It is scaring me and the thing that makes that even scarier is how little many people are aware of these multiple issues coinciding. We are approaching something of a perfect storm and it's like no one is watching the weather forecast.

@RedToothBrush I don't remember a time more worrying, and I grew up in the Cold War.
There's too many power crazed amoral leaders, some pretty extreme weather events, and some proper shady shit going on amongst the elite few.
Somethings gonna give.

I agree. My hobby / education was in media and history with a particular focus on 20th century and liberalism in general. Institutional structures and networks are crumbling rapidly in real time.

And just when you think it can't get bleaker, you read the next story, join the dots in practical implications and your imagination goes into overdrive

It's easy to get caught up with thinking you need a tin foil hat, but I do think the overall world position is critical. The system is failing and it's hard to see how it can be stopped before we hit an enormous crisis that will dwarf COVID in scope.

Trump is demanding Europe draw down on their diesel emergency supplies. Notably the UK is omitted from this - though that could be because we barely have any. He wants to free up the market ahead of the mid terms and this is a good way to do it. He is saying if they refuse he will ban diesel exports.

China have banned diesel exports in the last couple of days, as have India after a fire at a refinery which was running at over 100% capacity.

Meanwhile back in the US
PBF Energy just announce they were going down for 30-35 days on planned maintence.

This is their 165K bpd refinery in New Jersey.

Just at the worst possible point.

There's now rumours circulating in the US about an imminent trucker's strike over fuel prices. Many truckers are contractors who have to pay for fuel out of their own income but contracts are fixed so this is squeezing them hard. A dozen or so middle sized companies have gone out of business in recent months. There's been two haulage firms in the UK too. One in Cumbria and I think the other was over Wrexham way (but don't quote me on the latter).

Diesel futures in the US are starting to drop whilst petrol prices are going up. This means the market is anticipating a diesel exports ban (diesel production being pushed down in the US equals less petrol produced and then that starts to get tight).

Trump started talking last night that we were about to head into a depression. (As in economic 1930s). This isn't beyond the realms of possibility. There is a credible chance given the fuel situation.

The scale of this is yet to dawn on so many people in the UK.

The BBC has finally got this as the lead story today. I expect it to start to ramp up now.

Something to watch:

Patrick De Haan AT GasBuddyGuy
if Canada were to pull the plug on sending the US oil- even for a week- states like MT, ID, WY, UT, ND, SD, NE, OK, MO, IA, MN, WI, IL, MI, IN, OH, KY, and TN would nearly immediately see huge problems.

If Trump bans diesel exports, Canada's response is very important.

A ban on exports doesn’t not necessarily result in lower prices across America. Due to the geographical concentration of refineries in US, and the vast scale of the country that doesn’t have pipelines, transporting excess diesel around the country to try to suppress prices is not feasible.

In addition, restricting exports would result in the global price going UP, thereby affecting the prices everywhere else, and across 80% of USA. So, yeah, sounds like a deluded, naive, ill-advised decision. I think we should anticipate DJT will therefore go for it, in desperation before the midterms to try to enact a win.

I can't pretend to understand all the intricacies.
Your updates on this thread are very appreciated @RedToothBrush.
All I know is there's a big ol' shitstorm brewin'

Nope. It will be positive for the gulf area but the coasts would be negatively impacted. Notably red states would fare better than blue though.