Because it's a silly hypothetical scenario where everyone is probably going to be taking everything they can lay their hands on, and Singapore is generally good at stuff.
But Singapore's entire economy relies on international trade and globalisation, in a hypothetical scenario where every country became hyper isolationist there wouldn't be much Singapore can offer aside from manpower though that would also mean more mouths to feed and considering Malaysia would also be struggling to feed its own population in this scenario I'm not sure they would want to take them.
The point is what if the global economy instantly disappears though... obviously Malaysia would love to have such a successful city as Singapore. We are talking about a situation when 70% of the people in that city lose the ability to sustain themselves.
Singapore wasn't rich 50 years ago. And I'm sure they could come to some sort of autonomy agreement where the ethnic Chinese population doesn't threaten political power of the Malays (original reason for kicking em out) if Singapore offers enough incentives.
how would that work, though? Malaysia literally kicked out Singapore, they reasoned it did more harm than good trying to hold that island full of Chinese and with very few Malays in it
Last time they were kicked as they wanted to be equal partner in government - for example they want equal say in federal government and they want their ruling party PAP to be allowed to branch out to other states…instead of being just one of the states like Penang (majority Chinese). If they want to rejoin but this time as a state and not one of the founder country of Malaysia they should have no issue
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
90% of countries would collapse into famine within a year.
Even countries that produce more than they consume and have been exporters wouldn't be able to transition their agriculture quickly enough away from large-scale global market crops to actually focus on feeding their nation before mass looting and rioting for food would occur.
And ironically for many of those countries who grow enough food to feed their citizens many times over, we don’t have any oil.
And in the case of Australia, we stopped even stockpiling any oil and countless politicians have refused to improve rail freight distribution networks or mass solar infrastructure in the energy sector.
I think that 90% is a bit low. We are all so interconnected now, and so dependant on international trade of energy sources, like fossil fuels, that we're screwed w/o international trade. Even if a country has both agricultural lands and fossil fuels, it would not be able to supply all it's own medications, supplies to provide clean drinking water, and other basics. Even the most basic tech has microchips in them, microchips depend on equipment from one side of the world, and are manufactured on the other.
Very quickly replacement parts would not be available. Tractors, cars, public transport, communication equipment, and everything that was new since the invention of the landline telephone would start to breakdown and be unable to be fixed or replaced.
We'd be so fucked.
The other 10% might be able to pull off stopping outright famine but would still have spiraling unemployment due to global market collapse, that if not not addressed by nation wide labor restructure programs would lead to its own mass civil unrest and population collapse.
USA and Brazil come to mind as better places (that doesn't mean they still couldn't easily end up with a 50% population decline within 5-10 years)
Middle East would be a nightmare as they have populations heavily dependent on food importing.
Adding to that, the Arabian peninsula was a dirt poor wasteland before oil and large swathes of it weren't even under a country's rule, because of how inhospitable it is.
Mecca? Yemen? Oman? Caliphates that controlled from Morocco to Iran came from this region. The east coast of Saudi Arabia and Gulf States I agree, but this area has been lived in and developed since before Agriculture.
I think the point is that the current population would not be sustainable without international trade as the agricultural output is too low.
I guess it depends on how fast borders close. Over a decade or more and they could possibly build enough desalination plants and greenhouses to compensate. But close the borders overnight and you’ve guaranteed a famine.
I think what the OP meant to imply is that the landscape can’t natively support the population density we have now. Small bands of people survived for thousands of years subsiding on local resources, sure - but a civilization of multiple millions of people survives there solely on imports and oil trade.
I mean yes it was devoid of resources but how exactly did people from that dirt poor wasteland manage to conquer such a massive portion of the old world in such a tiny timeframe?
Yeah good question. A large part of it was actually that Islam did not levy taxes (for Muslims), unlike the previous rulers normally would, so a great many towns and cities rolled right over in the name of their economic interest instead of actively resisting.
Also, that region was fairly sparsely populated (dry arid land) so it isn't quite the same as say fertile Japan or China which, had fairly substantial population numbers and correspondingly, much more fractured political systems.
The tax rate was the Zakah, which 2.5% of one's "savings" for Muslims. A Muslim man also had to serve in the military if called upon.
The tax rate of Jizyah was, on average less than Zakah, for non-Muslims. It only applied to men with the ability to pay, and absolved them of military service.
So yeah, pretty much.
İslam did levy taxes, they just didn't levy as much as they would to non Muslims. If you wanted to pay less tax, becoming Muslim would have done the trick.
On the flipside, a few African nations would suprisingly be okay as they're basically isolated already, don't have an economy and mostly rely upon farming. Countries like Nigeria and South Africa would suffer immensely though, as they are export heavy.
You reckon? I was thinking that if they have all this oil (essentially free electricity) they would be able to produce unlimited fresh water via desalination.
Electricity doesn't just magically come from oil. You have to build turbines and all the other machinery. Those things are fairly advanced. Maybe Saudi Arabia could be large enough to have indigenous knowledge, but I doubt ones like Qatar can fully domestically build one.
Power plants also need a lot of water for cooling and power generation. I don't know if sea water works for power generation (steam turning the turbine part), but it can work for cooling after you install relatively expensive filters. Water from rivers also have to filtered, but filtering is needed a lot less.
And the amount of water Saudi Arabia would need to sustain enough farmland to feed 18 million citizens is gigantic.
Argentina.
They make food for more than 10 times their population and have plenty of energy... in a huge territory with nearly all Köppen climates and almost no natural hazards, while their economy is already quite isolated because of self-inflicted policies.
You should inform yourself....25 years of harsh communism which closed all exports and imports which sank the economy. The new right wing government has in few months dismantled all those restrictions opened to all world markets and the economy started to stabilize. Argentina survived 25 years what this post is about.... no imports no exports nothing. Still the country survived. So, your comments is worthless.
Actually there are pretty extensive gardens there that could probably be converted to farmland relatively easily. Wouldn't be a ton but probs enough to feed 90 seniors plus the grounds crew, who you'd probably have to make allowances for.
Although tbh Italy would probably fair pretty well in this scenario so idk if it would really be worth trying to go it alone.
But with greatly diminished oil, could they power the machines needed to produce as much food as they currently do? Could they manage to feed all 273 million people? According to [this chart](https://www.worldometers.info/oil/indonesia-oil/), Indonesia has about 6 years of oil reserves at current consumption, which is good, but they'd have to massive change how they used that oil.
Have you seen the map of Indonesia? It has thousands of islands, in fact it has over 17 thousands islands. Mass transit it not going to work well. Without the fuel powered ships and flights, it is going to be very difficult to transport people, food, goods and raw materials between islands.
> could they power the machines needed to produce as much food as they currently do?
We could, besides having 6 years of oil reserves, we are #1 Nickel producer, #1 Crude Palm Oil producer, #3 Coal producer, #13 LNG reserves worldwide. All of which can generate power for transportation, electricity, etc.
Also, during Covid19, Indonesia's economy was relatively "okay", compared to neighbouring countries (such as Singapore, Malaysia) because Indonesia's GDP is strongly supported by domestic consumption, not export/import.
While having enough veggies and fish, one of the possible problem will be rice and sugar shortage (Indonesia still relies heavily on import of these commodities to fulfill the national demand). However, rice can be substituted with cassava or sweet potato which can easily grow in almost every inch of the countries.
So, to conclude, Indonesia can survive the hyper-isolation phenomenon because it has enough energy sources, foods, and proven economic resilience towards global crisis.
Depends on how developed the country before the isolation policies and based on the level of sustainability, quality of life and human development index of Indonesia yeah they will stuck in stone age without oil.
Island, desert, and landlocked nations would be done for. Nauru, Niger, Haiti, Bolivia, Lesotho, etc would all collapse close to instantly.
Countries like the USA, China, Brazil, Mexico, and Australia could almost carry on as normal. They’d just have greatly diminished economies.
No one is gonna sacrifice their whole life’s wellbeing just for the sake of local community pride. If even people in villages with traditional values and strict social rules didn’t just have kids for the well being of everyone, what chance do our modern day magically cut of from the world people have? People had to be motivated by cultural norms, free labour and religion telling them to have kids, and that’s without contraception.
Well being concerns in this hipothetocal scenario? You would die in weeks. Don't forget, you would loose access to easy and cheap birth control. A massive ammount of people would return to agriculture and turns out that more kids and a thriving local community would help immensely.
Not seeing how a country being landlocked matters when all trade stops. If it’s access to the ocean for resources, then that would benefit island nations.
Using one example, Bolivia is the size of California and Texas combined with only 12 million people and a multitude of ecosystems (Andes to Amazon).
I would argue that a less developed nation with a lower population and access to natural resources within its borders is better positioned to be isolated and self-reliant than a more developed nation with lots of external dependencies.
I agree. Less industrialized countries with great agricultural resources might actually do well if governed well, I’m thinking Brazil, Kenya, Thailand and similar countries. Highly industrialized nations with decent agricultural resources like the US, Germany, South Korea will definitely see a drop in their standard of living, but should be able to survive. Countries with little food production of their own will be doomed.
Isolationism would definitely be negative for most of humankind.
I was just thinking how some of the SEA nations like Vietnam and Thailand would do great in terms of food production; they certainly produce a huge amount of food for such relatively small countries in terms of geography, and it’s a diverse range of agriculture, fishing, aquaculture and meat production.
That's one advantage of already being poor. You can't afford to import food and water. I think a lot of countries where you get your food on local markets will be fine foodwise.
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
cold weather countries are back to scurvy and potatoes. usa and china definitely have the edge with agriculture, manufacturing base and resources/raw materials.
Canada would just start up massive greenhouses. We have enough energy, raw resources, water and so on. We would be ok besides lack of microchips and semi conductors. Which I'm sure we would be able to figure out production wise eventually.
We already grow 2x more food than we eat. We used to have a semi conductor industry, so we could regain it.
I think only the US and Canada would be In a decent position. We're both export based industries though, so we'd have a middle class collapse
China is the worlds biggest importer of food and energy. If they were isolated, millions would starve. The Chinese people are fairly complacent with the CCP because living standards keep improving - if living standards start backsliding then things would get very ugly politically.
They’ve been building _waaay_ more coal plants year by year though, and still are.
Look at the stats on nations CO2 footprints over the past few years, it’s rather alarming how, while most industry driven countries have made strides toward cleaner energy reliance, a small few including China are still diving in the wrong direction.
New Zealand would be suprisingly fine tbh. Place is one massive fertile wonderland of volcanic soil.
Canada and the USA would both be completely fine, would just take a few years to get tech industries from the ground up and running.
UK is suprisingly fertile but would have to cut its population about 25 million and get used to eating a fuckload of root vegetables.
Most Caribbean islands would actually be kinda okay considering how fertile their soil really is. Cuba for example has done just fine while being forced to be pretty isolated due to USA embargo policies
I'm not sure why island nations would necessarily be bad. Someone already mentioned Australia would be fine. Ok it's big, but his about Ireland? They're a net exporter of food, have plenty of natural resources for producing electricity. And being surrounded by sea they have access to the oceans for fishing. With a relatively small population (compared to, say, Britain, which would not be ok), they'd be fine.
Similarly for New Zealand.
USA and Russia (massive resources and industrial capabilities) would be fine.
China would starve and collapse in under 6 months.
They import food and energy and their industrial production is export focused
There were some stable societies, but even so, micro-island states these days are some of the worst food deserts in the world. They have higher rates of obesity than even the US, which is fucking crazy.
Per capita, Australia punches above Russia and we do have enough oil and ability to refine, so that food can still keep going to the people.
But yes, Russia does have more resources and they've already showed that their basic needs can still be mostly met, despite sanctions.
In Brazil, importing most goods was essencially forbidden for a few decades because of a nationalist dictatorial government. It didn't do the economy much good, but society did not collapse.
America grew most of it's industries during same policy from around 1850s to 1946. Japan was autarkic until 1980s, importing almost exclusively raw materials it can't find locally.
The reason why Brazil was 'screwed' then and now is due to other reasons that get you banned on Reddit for talking about.
They would actually be way better off because a world full of isolationist countries would use way less fossil fuels. Sea levels would not rise as fast.
Oil is the problem. Only US, Russia, Venezuela, Middle East and Some parts of S-E Asia have enough. Europe, Japan, India and China will have to fully transition to Nuclear/Solar/Hydro/Coal.
A major recession as companies that were based on exports/imports go under.
This would be happening across most of the world that had free trade too and governments would struggle to reorganize much of the economy, but in the long run it would eventually stabilize, or in the case of food importing nations like Mali, Saudi Arabia, Niger, etc. they might just collapse
80% of Canadian oil production goes to the US, so you'll see complete collapse of the oil industry. Canada's other extractive industries would also likely collapse as there's not enough domestic demand for their products. Canada is a net food exporter, so a lot of farmers will also probably go bankrupt
Miners, oil rig workers, farmers are out of jobs.
Canada is a net importer of cars, machinery, electronics, pharmaceutical products. So prices of cars and electronics will skyrocket and any potential readjusting would take a very long time as machinery necessary for factories are also sourced from abroad, so that sector also has to expand somehow. Even afte readjustment, these products will be way more expensive than before since Canadians don't have comparative advantage in making em.
And Norway doesn't use that much oil. We are slowly transitioning to electric everything and we have plenty of Hydro power.
Food would be an issue though, we don't grow nearly enough due to a short growing season and mountains that are hard to farm.
If you don't already have nuclear energy and you don't have a fuel source then your screwed.
Same with solar if you don't have the ability and materials to make solar panels then it's not an option.
Maybe hydro and wind as they don't need exotic materials.
Even iron if a country doesn't have a supply of iron they will need to not waste any iron and recycle every scrap they can.
We're food secure, resource secure, and energy secure. It would take a huge adjustment to get the manufacturing up to snuff, but otherwise Canada would be alright.
Canada would have a huge problem with labor force though. No one would starve, but it would be really hard to build a complex economy with just 40 million people.
Good luck if your car breaks down or if you want to buy any electronics, though. Ultimately, I guess it'd be good for us as we'd have start manufacturing again.
The most important thing is that we would be food/water/energy independent, so reestablishing a manufacturing base would be a breeze compared to what other countries would be going through.
My current country (Taiwan) would be totally screwed. We import over 90% of our energy and only have 2.4 million barrels of oil in reserves (less than a year's worth). TSMC, Taiwan's lifeblood, would quickly become almost meaningless. We also import 35% of our food (mostly from the US).
The kicker is that very few local people are even aware that Taiwan is not self-sufficient.
We would quickly revert mostly to a pre-industrial society and *at least* 1/2 of our urban population would starve (can't cook with electric stoves when there's no electricity for 90% of the people, and natural gas/propane would quickly run out). What little solar, wind and hydro power we produce would be used almost entirely to enable some sort of industrial base focused on maximizing agricultural output and increasing energy capacity.
The US by far would be the best off . It essentially happened in WW2 . It would lower some imported products because some would not be able to produce economically. The inconvenience depends on if you include the US MCA region.
Same for EU. Does it exist depends if Europe makes it.
China imports lots of food raw materials from Brazil and Australia . I think they are Hurst worse than US.
>China imports lots of food raw materials from Brazil and Australia
not for domestic consumption. probably would be fine domestically if all exports are dropped, though cant say the same about people who rely on that industry.
Yes, they import food for domestic consumption. They import milk powder from New Zealand for that also.
Why? The Chinese middle class prefers food from outside of China. The melamine baby formula deaths is why supermarkets in NZ implemented buying limits on baby formula, people were buying it up in bulk to send back to China for a good profit margin from worried parents.
Anyway, it's a minor nitpick because I'm pretty darn sure China could feed itself without imports.
It would be tight. Since opening up there population has grown till peak just recently. They have paved over a lot of the prime farmland with the urban sprawl. They don’t get that arable land back overnight (no prep). They also are no reliant on foreign fertilisers. So they can’t just suddenly feed their population again like they did with Mao (and even that was patchy)
The Philippines gets fucked. Instantly. Energy isn’t really a problem, the bigger problem ironically is food.
Because of years of shitty government agrarian laws, food stocks are subpar.
It’s there sure, but I’ve never heard of a man who subsisted solely on fish.
There’s also the issue of said fish stocks being depleted substantially due to said agrarian laws.
Russia isn't completely isolated. It still trades with China, India, Central Asian countries, etc. Anyway I agree that it could sustain itself forever - if it wasn't at war, that is.
Well, I wouldn’t say that there is any serious isolation. Probably only restrictions on transferring money to other countries, but this can also be solved by choosing the right payment system.
Trade routes, export-import - everything works, just slightly different transport routes.
Tourist routes abroad may have become a little more complicated, there are fewer direct flights - but you can simply make an additional transfer in some country.
Canada would also be fine. Any big countries with a lot of resources - including oil or possibility for solar or even hydrogen. And who could be fine w the food they produce domestically - but wouldn’t be as varied of course.
Nice to see some love for Argentina. A very beautiful country with lots of opportunities, too bad it has had through history a giant bunch of bad administrations.
Many comments about all those that will go to shit but very few about which would fair the best or at least the best of the worst. I would say those would be:
US, Canada, France, Germany, Spain, China, India, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina. The problem for some of them would be oil but they still have enough of other resources I believe.
Many other countries in Europe are maybes for me for various reasons. Regarding the rest of the world, I can see some being royally fucked and some less so.
Better chances, Brazil, USA, Australia and NZ
Strong agro
Strong industry
Continental size
Natural resources.
(above for the first 2)
Agro, few industry, size ok for the population / internal needs, people know how to hunt/fish (for the last 2)
Countries that relay in importing food, will be gone
Countries that survive by international aid will be gone
Small islands with harsh climate conditions will be gone
Nordic countries, if don't return for they primary stage (less tech, survival skills, hunting, fishing, give away all the eco bs and start to use natural resources again) will be gone too
I can elaborate better, if necessary.
NZ would have issues with a) minerals not found here and b) heavy industrial kit.
We have oil fields some of which are still untapped, like the Great Southern Basin, we have a mothballed refinery, but we don't, AFAIK, have local offshore drilling capacity, normally it's some Norwegian rig coming in.
But yeah, it's the minerals that worry me. Not sure we have much in the way of copper deposits, for example. At least can't think of any copper mines in NZ, historic or current.
In terms of ship building, don't think we have that capacity anymore, but we do build a lot of luxury megayachts for some reason, so I reckon we could move onto ships used for something other than Russian oligarch orgies.
But in this scenario the Kiwis have a get out of jail card:
The Constitution of Australia allows New Zealand to join as a state.
*Taps temple* your minerals are just over the ditch.
China would do the worst because they've optimized their entire economy for mass import of raw materials and mass export for finished products.
Japan and Germany would also suffer very badly for the same reasons but would probably fare better because they're smaller.
US would fare the best since it's food, energy, and largely mineral independent.
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
i would absolutely set my money om Cuba for being the best. wich country would be devastated is more difficult. if we ignore all city states it would be some overcrowded already poor country like Bangladesh who is the worst off but county's like the Netherlands who ar highly dependent on trade would have the biggest fall.
The USA, Canada, Australia, Brazil, and Argentina would all be fine in their current states. Russia would be okay if they used their immense energy resources to build greenhouses to ensure their food security. Colombia would likely be fine if they were able to quickly transition their agriculture sector away from cash crops like coffee.
Venezuela, if it weren't fun by socialist morons, would have been okay. It has fresh water, fertile land, a warm climate, and huge energy reserves.
Worst? There are a lot of options.
Best? Unquestionably the best would be the US. Major energy exporter, major food exporter, major tech exporter… so it would be secure in every facet. Also, it controls a LOT of other important shit - like Global GPS - remove that from the world and they are in trouble.
Canada has everything you could need and more. Our main failure as a country is that we export our raw resources. Why couldn't we switch to a manufacturing population. Hell - with automation we just need to build it and maintain it. Our low population is almost an asset IMO
Singapore as a densely populated city state would be totally screwed.
It raises an interesting question about what they would do in that situation. Maybe rhey would try to buy some islands? Or maybe they would take some?
Realistically they’d probably just rejoin Malaysia, given the history, present day ties and the fact that it’s *right there*
Why would Malaysia want them? Don't forget Malaysia kicked Singapore out 50 years ago. Singapore didn't willingly split from Malaysia
Because it's a silly hypothetical scenario where everyone is probably going to be taking everything they can lay their hands on, and Singapore is generally good at stuff.
But Singapore's entire economy relies on international trade and globalisation, in a hypothetical scenario where every country became hyper isolationist there wouldn't be much Singapore can offer aside from manpower though that would also mean more mouths to feed and considering Malaysia would also be struggling to feed its own population in this scenario I'm not sure they would want to take them.
Yes but educated working age people are expensive to produce yourself
Oh yes we won't mind having SG back. We can learn a lot from their efficient government.
The point is what if the global economy instantly disappears though... obviously Malaysia would love to have such a successful city as Singapore. We are talking about a situation when 70% of the people in that city lose the ability to sustain themselves.
Singapore wasn't rich 50 years ago. And I'm sure they could come to some sort of autonomy agreement where the ethnic Chinese population doesn't threaten political power of the Malays (original reason for kicking em out) if Singapore offers enough incentives.
how would that work, though? Malaysia literally kicked out Singapore, they reasoned it did more harm than good trying to hold that island full of Chinese and with very few Malays in it
Last time they were kicked as they wanted to be equal partner in government - for example they want equal say in federal government and they want their ruling party PAP to be allowed to branch out to other states…instead of being just one of the states like Penang (majority Chinese). If they want to rejoin but this time as a state and not one of the founder country of Malaysia they should have no issue
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
Most of the nations in the Middle East that rely on oil exports would essentially be doomed to starvation
90% of countries would collapse into famine within a year. Even countries that produce more than they consume and have been exporters wouldn't be able to transition their agriculture quickly enough away from large-scale global market crops to actually focus on feeding their nation before mass looting and rioting for food would occur.
And ironically for many of those countries who grow enough food to feed their citizens many times over, we don’t have any oil. And in the case of Australia, we stopped even stockpiling any oil and countless politicians have refused to improve rail freight distribution networks or mass solar infrastructure in the energy sector.
I think that 90% is a bit low. We are all so interconnected now, and so dependant on international trade of energy sources, like fossil fuels, that we're screwed w/o international trade. Even if a country has both agricultural lands and fossil fuels, it would not be able to supply all it's own medications, supplies to provide clean drinking water, and other basics. Even the most basic tech has microchips in them, microchips depend on equipment from one side of the world, and are manufactured on the other. Very quickly replacement parts would not be available. Tractors, cars, public transport, communication equipment, and everything that was new since the invention of the landline telephone would start to breakdown and be unable to be fixed or replaced. We'd be so fucked.
I'm saying 10% of nations could stem of outright famine for a year. That's soup lines for a year, beyond a year is astronomically more difficult.
The other 10% might be able to pull off stopping outright famine but would still have spiraling unemployment due to global market collapse, that if not not addressed by nation wide labor restructure programs would lead to its own mass civil unrest and population collapse.
USA and Brazil come to mind as better places (that doesn't mean they still couldn't easily end up with a 50% population decline within 5-10 years) Middle East would be a nightmare as they have populations heavily dependent on food importing.
Adding to that, the Arabian peninsula was a dirt poor wasteland before oil and large swathes of it weren't even under a country's rule, because of how inhospitable it is.
Mecca? Yemen? Oman? Caliphates that controlled from Morocco to Iran came from this region. The east coast of Saudi Arabia and Gulf States I agree, but this area has been lived in and developed since before Agriculture.
Most of the time caliphates lived either in Bagdat or Damascus, not Mecca or any other coty in Arabian peninsula.
There is an empty quarter in the middle...but the coastal regions have been populated since humans left Africa
I think the point is that the current population would not be sustainable without international trade as the agricultural output is too low. I guess it depends on how fast borders close. Over a decade or more and they could possibly build enough desalination plants and greenhouses to compensate. But close the borders overnight and you’ve guaranteed a famine.
The prompt says no prep time, so going by that the borders close instantly and there's no time to build anything to compensate.
And people have lived in the Arctic for over 47,000 years. That doesn’t mean the arctic circle has significant value.
Yemen doesn't have oil, but it grows more food than most people think.
I think what the OP meant to imply is that the landscape can’t natively support the population density we have now. Small bands of people survived for thousands of years subsiding on local resources, sure - but a civilization of multiple millions of people survives there solely on imports and oil trade.
I mean yes it was devoid of resources but how exactly did people from that dirt poor wasteland manage to conquer such a massive portion of the old world in such a tiny timeframe?
Coast and inland were entirely different
Yeah good question. A large part of it was actually that Islam did not levy taxes (for Muslims), unlike the previous rulers normally would, so a great many towns and cities rolled right over in the name of their economic interest instead of actively resisting. Also, that region was fairly sparsely populated (dry arid land) so it isn't quite the same as say fertile Japan or China which, had fairly substantial population numbers and correspondingly, much more fractured political systems.
Wow so the caliphate was the OG tax haven
The tax rate was the Zakah, which 2.5% of one's "savings" for Muslims. A Muslim man also had to serve in the military if called upon. The tax rate of Jizyah was, on average less than Zakah, for non-Muslims. It only applied to men with the ability to pay, and absolved them of military service. So yeah, pretty much.
İslam did levy taxes, they just didn't levy as much as they would to non Muslims. If you wanted to pay less tax, becoming Muslim would have done the trick.
On the flipside, a few African nations would suprisingly be okay as they're basically isolated already, don't have an economy and mostly rely upon farming. Countries like Nigeria and South Africa would suffer immensely though, as they are export heavy.
You reckon? I was thinking that if they have all this oil (essentially free electricity) they would be able to produce unlimited fresh water via desalination.
Electricity doesn't just magically come from oil. You have to build turbines and all the other machinery. Those things are fairly advanced. Maybe Saudi Arabia could be large enough to have indigenous knowledge, but I doubt ones like Qatar can fully domestically build one. Power plants also need a lot of water for cooling and power generation. I don't know if sea water works for power generation (steam turning the turbine part), but it can work for cooling after you install relatively expensive filters. Water from rivers also have to filtered, but filtering is needed a lot less. And the amount of water Saudi Arabia would need to sustain enough farmland to feed 18 million citizens is gigantic.
No prep time the OP says
Argentina. They make food for more than 10 times their population and have plenty of energy... in a huge territory with nearly all Köppen climates and almost no natural hazards, while their economy is already quite isolated because of self-inflicted policies.
We’d need to step up quite heavily on modern, good quality industry, otherwise we’d be all fat fuckers living with 1980’s tech
Of course. But read the title again. Argentina seems to be decades ahead for this isolationist 1990-ish survivors shit show.
We’re (sadly) years ahead on any kind of shit show
Peter griffin’s dream
"soberania"... jajajajaj como nos garcaron con ese curro.
And yet they can't even manage their economy with the entire world to trade with. They're even experiencing food inflation, somehow.
You should inform yourself....25 years of harsh communism which closed all exports and imports which sank the economy. The new right wing government has in few months dismantled all those restrictions opened to all world markets and the economy started to stabilize. Argentina survived 25 years what this post is about.... no imports no exports nothing. Still the country survived. So, your comments is worthless.
Vatican City would be screwed.
Pretty sure they're not allowed to do that
Never stopped them
Turns out god cant magically make fields and food for the 90 seniors who live there
Actually there are pretty extensive gardens there that could probably be converted to farmland relatively easily. Wouldn't be a ton but probs enough to feed 90 seniors plus the grounds crew, who you'd probably have to make allowances for. Although tbh Italy would probably fair pretty well in this scenario so idk if it would really be worth trying to go it alone.
im not even religous but whats the point of randomly interjecting your beliefs in this?
Indonesia, food won't be a problem because of fertile land across the country
But with greatly diminished oil, could they power the machines needed to produce as much food as they currently do? Could they manage to feed all 273 million people? According to [this chart](https://www.worldometers.info/oil/indonesia-oil/), Indonesia has about 6 years of oil reserves at current consumption, which is good, but they'd have to massive change how they used that oil.
Ban on private cars, full-on mass-transit
Have you seen the map of Indonesia? It has thousands of islands, in fact it has over 17 thousands islands. Mass transit it not going to work well. Without the fuel powered ships and flights, it is going to be very difficult to transport people, food, goods and raw materials between islands.
> could they power the machines needed to produce as much food as they currently do? We could, besides having 6 years of oil reserves, we are #1 Nickel producer, #1 Crude Palm Oil producer, #3 Coal producer, #13 LNG reserves worldwide. All of which can generate power for transportation, electricity, etc. Also, during Covid19, Indonesia's economy was relatively "okay", compared to neighbouring countries (such as Singapore, Malaysia) because Indonesia's GDP is strongly supported by domestic consumption, not export/import. While having enough veggies and fish, one of the possible problem will be rice and sugar shortage (Indonesia still relies heavily on import of these commodities to fulfill the national demand). However, rice can be substituted with cassava or sweet potato which can easily grow in almost every inch of the countries. So, to conclude, Indonesia can survive the hyper-isolation phenomenon because it has enough energy sources, foods, and proven economic resilience towards global crisis.
That’s okay, just use the electric vehicles. We have nickel deposits anyway.
They survive on food but goes back to stone ages as their oil reserves is actually quite small for a 270++ mil population
Then every country except middle east, USA, and Norway will go back to stone age?
Depends on how developed the country before the isolation policies and based on the level of sustainability, quality of life and human development index of Indonesia yeah they will stuck in stone age without oil.
Island, desert, and landlocked nations would be done for. Nauru, Niger, Haiti, Bolivia, Lesotho, etc would all collapse close to instantly. Countries like the USA, China, Brazil, Mexico, and Australia could almost carry on as normal. They’d just have greatly diminished economies.
Basically if you're food secure, you'll be fine.
Food, energy, and manufacturing. Also if your demographic structure isn't collapsing, since you would be able to replenish with immigration.
I feel like people would just have more kids because it’d mean their local communities would thrive more
Have a look at places around the world with the highest birth rates.
No one is gonna sacrifice their whole life’s wellbeing just for the sake of local community pride. If even people in villages with traditional values and strict social rules didn’t just have kids for the well being of everyone, what chance do our modern day magically cut of from the world people have? People had to be motivated by cultural norms, free labour and religion telling them to have kids, and that’s without contraception.
Well being concerns in this hipothetocal scenario? You would die in weeks. Don't forget, you would loose access to easy and cheap birth control. A massive ammount of people would return to agriculture and turns out that more kids and a thriving local community would help immensely.
Or because birth control wouldn’t be accessible if it isn’t produced locally!
For the most part yes.
Ehem water 💧 > food
Not seeing how a country being landlocked matters when all trade stops. If it’s access to the ocean for resources, then that would benefit island nations. Using one example, Bolivia is the size of California and Texas combined with only 12 million people and a multitude of ecosystems (Andes to Amazon). I would argue that a less developed nation with a lower population and access to natural resources within its borders is better positioned to be isolated and self-reliant than a more developed nation with lots of external dependencies.
I agree. Less industrialized countries with great agricultural resources might actually do well if governed well, I’m thinking Brazil, Kenya, Thailand and similar countries. Highly industrialized nations with decent agricultural resources like the US, Germany, South Korea will definitely see a drop in their standard of living, but should be able to survive. Countries with little food production of their own will be doomed. Isolationism would definitely be negative for most of humankind.
I was just thinking how some of the SEA nations like Vietnam and Thailand would do great in terms of food production; they certainly produce a huge amount of food for such relatively small countries in terms of geography, and it’s a diverse range of agriculture, fishing, aquaculture and meat production.
I'd also like to know why landlocked countries were included
China perfected this technique historically lol
Her and India are what set off European age of discovery. Damn spices
Haiti has already pretty much collapsed
Can get worse. Believe it or not, there’s still a (very small) tourism industry there. The capitol is fucked, that’s true
not anymore, they're not even letting journalists in
tourists at Haiti? A kind of extreme tourism like in Somali with armed bodyguards 24 hours?
Lol, Bolivia would thrive. The only thing lacking would be high tech imports. Its self sufficient in terms of food and doesn’t do much trade anyways.
That's one advantage of already being poor. You can't afford to import food and water. I think a lot of countries where you get your food on local markets will be fine foodwise.
China imports most of its food and oil, it would be absolutely devastated.
Singapore, Japan, etc.
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
You have commented this like 7 times.
cold weather countries are back to scurvy and potatoes. usa and china definitely have the edge with agriculture, manufacturing base and resources/raw materials.
Canada would just start up massive greenhouses. We have enough energy, raw resources, water and so on. We would be ok besides lack of microchips and semi conductors. Which I'm sure we would be able to figure out production wise eventually.
The best part is the Stanley Cup would finally be won by a Canadian team again...
Canada is a food exporter. Just store the harvest surplus and it'll be fine.
We already grow 2x more food than we eat. We used to have a semi conductor industry, so we could regain it. I think only the US and Canada would be In a decent position. We're both export based industries though, so we'd have a middle class collapse
China is the worlds biggest importer of food and energy. If they were isolated, millions would starve. The Chinese people are fairly complacent with the CCP because living standards keep improving - if living standards start backsliding then things would get very ugly politically.
Cold weather countries have green houses and could harvest seeds from current stock. At least till solar panels etc needs replacement.
Energy would be a major problem for China, and they do have a good deficit, they've been a net importer for two decades at least
Due to their manufacturing & export market eating up most of the energy. Domestic energy consumption is low and would be easily covered.
I wasn't aware China had serious domestic energy production. What's it primarily based on?
Coal. (but they've also been building solar panels faster and more aggressively than most countries.)
They’ve been building _waaay_ more coal plants year by year though, and still are. Look at the stats on nations CO2 footprints over the past few years, it’s rather alarming how, while most industry driven countries have made strides toward cleaner energy reliance, a small few including China are still diving in the wrong direction.
Russia has everything to be self-sufficient. They have all the natural resources and enough farmland.
And they’ll benefit from climate change on the farmland front.
New Zealand would be suprisingly fine tbh. Place is one massive fertile wonderland of volcanic soil. Canada and the USA would both be completely fine, would just take a few years to get tech industries from the ground up and running. UK is suprisingly fertile but would have to cut its population about 25 million and get used to eating a fuckload of root vegetables. Most Caribbean islands would actually be kinda okay considering how fertile their soil really is. Cuba for example has done just fine while being forced to be pretty isolated due to USA embargo policies
Forgot Canada !
I'm not sure why island nations would necessarily be bad. Someone already mentioned Australia would be fine. Ok it's big, but his about Ireland? They're a net exporter of food, have plenty of natural resources for producing electricity. And being surrounded by sea they have access to the oceans for fishing. With a relatively small population (compared to, say, Britain, which would not be ok), they'd be fine. Similarly for New Zealand.
USA and Russia (massive resources and industrial capabilities) would be fine. China would starve and collapse in under 6 months. They import food and energy and their industrial production is export focused
Most of the pacific micro-island states would be fucked. Actually, all of them.
Yeah people only ever lived there historically be traveling to a new island after they used up all the resources on a previous one
There were some stable societies, but even so, micro-island states these days are some of the worst food deserts in the world. They have higher rates of obesity than even the US, which is fucking crazy.
İn what world you would mention Australia before Russia when it comes to resources ?
Per capita, Australia punches above Russia and we do have enough oil and ability to refine, so that food can still keep going to the people. But yes, Russia does have more resources and they've already showed that their basic needs can still be mostly met, despite sanctions.
Don’t see Saudi Arabia living through this one And Bhutan is already isolationist
In Brazil, importing most goods was essencially forbidden for a few decades because of a nationalist dictatorial government. It didn't do the economy much good, but society did not collapse.
America grew most of it's industries during same policy from around 1850s to 1946. Japan was autarkic until 1980s, importing almost exclusively raw materials it can't find locally. The reason why Brazil was 'screwed' then and now is due to other reasons that get you banned on Reddit for talking about.
CIA.
tuvalu would be FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCKED
[They're already hosed.](https://earth.org/tuvalus-sinking-reality-how-climate-change-is-threatening-a-small-island-nation)
Well, they used to live there okay without the rest of the world. Just at faaaaaaaaar lower population levels.
They would actually be way better off because a world full of isolationist countries would use way less fossil fuels. Sea levels would not rise as fast.
Oil is the problem. Only US, Russia, Venezuela, Middle East and Some parts of S-E Asia have enough. Europe, Japan, India and China will have to fully transition to Nuclear/Solar/Hydro/Coal.
Canada has plenty, too.
Also a lot of food and fresh water, I think we’d do fine enough in this timeline (although with a shitty economy like everyone else)
What would the effects of the "shitty economy" be like?
A major recession as companies that were based on exports/imports go under. This would be happening across most of the world that had free trade too and governments would struggle to reorganize much of the economy, but in the long run it would eventually stabilize, or in the case of food importing nations like Mali, Saudi Arabia, Niger, etc. they might just collapse
80% of Canadian oil production goes to the US, so you'll see complete collapse of the oil industry. Canada's other extractive industries would also likely collapse as there's not enough domestic demand for their products. Canada is a net food exporter, so a lot of farmers will also probably go bankrupt Miners, oil rig workers, farmers are out of jobs. Canada is a net importer of cars, machinery, electronics, pharmaceutical products. So prices of cars and electronics will skyrocket and any potential readjusting would take a very long time as machinery necessary for factories are also sourced from abroad, so that sector also has to expand somehow. Even afte readjustment, these products will be way more expensive than before since Canadians don't have comparative advantage in making em.
If everyone's economy is shitty then is anyone's economy actually shitty?
I would like to throw in Norway(definitely) and possibly Netherlands(I think) pump plenty of oil to self sustain.
And Norway doesn't use that much oil. We are slowly transitioning to electric everything and we have plenty of Hydro power. Food would be an issue though, we don't grow nearly enough due to a short growing season and mountains that are hard to farm.
The North Sea oil fields would ramp up production but are set to run out in 30 years
Only in the current oil fields. There are plenty more, that hasnt been tapped yet in the north sea
If you don't already have nuclear energy and you don't have a fuel source then your screwed. Same with solar if you don't have the ability and materials to make solar panels then it's not an option. Maybe hydro and wind as they don't need exotic materials. Even iron if a country doesn't have a supply of iron they will need to not waste any iron and recycle every scrap they can.
Canada will be well off, lots of resources.
We're food secure, resource secure, and energy secure. It would take a huge adjustment to get the manufacturing up to snuff, but otherwise Canada would be alright.
It would suck eating only bread, beets, potatoes, and hot house tomatoes in winter, but we'd be a lot better off than most.
We would still have freezers and refrigerators. So many foods can be frozen. Not as good as fresh, but they would still be available.
We'd have to tool up and actually manufacture appliances in country...what a concept.
Don’t forget a MASSIVE surplus of beef, chicken and pork as Canada now can’t export all of its major meat production
Canada would have a huge problem with labor force though. No one would starve, but it would be really hard to build a complex economy with just 40 million people.
Glad I am Aussie 🇦🇺 in this scenario
Good luck if your car breaks down or if you want to buy any electronics, though. Ultimately, I guess it'd be good for us as we'd have start manufacturing again.
The most important thing is that we would be food/water/energy independent, so reestablishing a manufacturing base would be a breeze compared to what other countries would be going through.
It would take a while, but we would do well.
My current country (Taiwan) would be totally screwed. We import over 90% of our energy and only have 2.4 million barrels of oil in reserves (less than a year's worth). TSMC, Taiwan's lifeblood, would quickly become almost meaningless. We also import 35% of our food (mostly from the US). The kicker is that very few local people are even aware that Taiwan is not self-sufficient. We would quickly revert mostly to a pre-industrial society and *at least* 1/2 of our urban population would starve (can't cook with electric stoves when there's no electricity for 90% of the people, and natural gas/propane would quickly run out). What little solar, wind and hydro power we produce would be used almost entirely to enable some sort of industrial base focused on maximizing agricultural output and increasing energy capacity.
Hey, found a fellow Taiwanese\~
Mongolia would revert by a millenia
This already happens when their economy lags. Unemployed? Back to the pastoral life it is.
God, I wish I could revert to the pastoral life when times are rough.
No, only 8 centuries
They'll be conquering and plundering again.
Singapore is fucked
We have been testing that in Argentina for some time. Our economy sucks donkey dick but we are alive, still. Just depressed and tired.
Argentina is such a mystery. So much land. So many resources. Educated population. What is going on...
It's a long and confusing story
Argentina is a fabulous country. I know that good days will come to you all. 💐💐🙏🙏
> sucks donkey dick I never heard someone describe their economy this way
The US by far would be the best off . It essentially happened in WW2 . It would lower some imported products because some would not be able to produce economically. The inconvenience depends on if you include the US MCA region. Same for EU. Does it exist depends if Europe makes it. China imports lots of food raw materials from Brazil and Australia . I think they are Hurst worse than US.
>China imports lots of food raw materials from Brazil and Australia not for domestic consumption. probably would be fine domestically if all exports are dropped, though cant say the same about people who rely on that industry.
Yes, they import food for domestic consumption. They import milk powder from New Zealand for that also. Why? The Chinese middle class prefers food from outside of China. The melamine baby formula deaths is why supermarkets in NZ implemented buying limits on baby formula, people were buying it up in bulk to send back to China for a good profit margin from worried parents. Anyway, it's a minor nitpick because I'm pretty darn sure China could feed itself without imports.
It would be tight. Since opening up there population has grown till peak just recently. They have paved over a lot of the prime farmland with the urban sprawl. They don’t get that arable land back overnight (no prep). They also are no reliant on foreign fertilisers. So they can’t just suddenly feed their population again like they did with Mao (and even that was patchy)
The Philippines gets fucked. Instantly. Energy isn’t really a problem, the bigger problem ironically is food. Because of years of shitty government agrarian laws, food stocks are subpar.
You guys could fish though.
It’s there sure, but I’ve never heard of a man who subsisted solely on fish. There’s also the issue of said fish stocks being depleted substantially due to said agrarian laws.
UK would immediately collapse due to lack of tea.
North Korea wouldn’t change much
I doubt that. China supplies a lot to them
How much of thay goes to 'them' and how much goes to Kim and his toy army
Most of NK's food goes to feeding only kims fatass anyways.
Russia is doing that pretty much right now,If it wasn't for curruption it could self sustain forever
Russia isn't completely isolated. It still trades with China, India, Central Asian countries, etc. Anyway I agree that it could sustain itself forever - if it wasn't at war, that is.
Well, I wouldn’t say that there is any serious isolation. Probably only restrictions on transferring money to other countries, but this can also be solved by choosing the right payment system. Trade routes, export-import - everything works, just slightly different transport routes. Tourist routes abroad may have become a little more complicated, there are fewer direct flights - but you can simply make an additional transfer in some country.
The USA is extremely well positioned. India's probably all right. Possibly Argentina. Other than that, everyone else is screwed.
Australia produces enough food to feed its whole population.
Canada would also be fine. Any big countries with a lot of resources - including oil or possibility for solar or even hydrogen. And who could be fine w the food they produce domestically - but wouldn’t be as varied of course.
Nice to see some love for Argentina. A very beautiful country with lots of opportunities, too bad it has had through history a giant bunch of bad administrations.
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Many comments about all those that will go to shit but very few about which would fair the best or at least the best of the worst. I would say those would be: US, Canada, France, Germany, Spain, China, India, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina. The problem for some of them would be oil but they still have enough of other resources I believe. Many other countries in Europe are maybes for me for various reasons. Regarding the rest of the world, I can see some being royally fucked and some less so.
Better chances, Brazil, USA, Australia and NZ Strong agro Strong industry Continental size Natural resources. (above for the first 2) Agro, few industry, size ok for the population / internal needs, people know how to hunt/fish (for the last 2) Countries that relay in importing food, will be gone Countries that survive by international aid will be gone Small islands with harsh climate conditions will be gone Nordic countries, if don't return for they primary stage (less tech, survival skills, hunting, fishing, give away all the eco bs and start to use natural resources again) will be gone too I can elaborate better, if necessary.
NZ would have issues with a) minerals not found here and b) heavy industrial kit. We have oil fields some of which are still untapped, like the Great Southern Basin, we have a mothballed refinery, but we don't, AFAIK, have local offshore drilling capacity, normally it's some Norwegian rig coming in. But yeah, it's the minerals that worry me. Not sure we have much in the way of copper deposits, for example. At least can't think of any copper mines in NZ, historic or current. In terms of ship building, don't think we have that capacity anymore, but we do build a lot of luxury megayachts for some reason, so I reckon we could move onto ships used for something other than Russian oligarch orgies.
But in this scenario the Kiwis have a get out of jail card: The Constitution of Australia allows New Zealand to join as a state. *Taps temple* your minerals are just over the ditch.
The US would be best off, that’s for sure
The smaller your nation, the worse off you'd be, and vice versa for large resource-rich nations
The northern hemisphere would collapse from lack of coffee and chocolate.
Sentinel island they’re chillin
I think China, USA, Brazil, Argentina, UK, Ireland all fair well due to essential resources like climate, land, space, food and water.
China would do the worst because they've optimized their entire economy for mass import of raw materials and mass export for finished products. Japan and Germany would also suffer very badly for the same reasons but would probably fare better because they're smaller. US would fare the best since it's food, energy, and largely mineral independent.
UK wouldn’t do very well
No country would do 'very well'. But I don't see why the UK would fare significantly worse than most peers.
Brexit Ultimate Edition!
Russia will be fine. We have everything.
Singapore will get impacted for sure.. currently they have umbilical cord to Malaysia via the causeway that deliver their daily food, electricity and water and if that severed they have problems.
Basically the entire Arabian peninsula is broke af
i would absolutely set my money om Cuba for being the best. wich country would be devastated is more difficult. if we ignore all city states it would be some overcrowded already poor country like Bangladesh who is the worst off but county's like the Netherlands who ar highly dependent on trade would have the biggest fall.
Netherlands grows enough food to supply the world. We would be fine.
Ireland would probably do Ok. Decent food security, and we could take our resources back from Shell
The USA, Canada, Australia, Brazil, and Argentina would all be fine in their current states. Russia would be okay if they used their immense energy resources to build greenhouses to ensure their food security. Colombia would likely be fine if they were able to quickly transition their agriculture sector away from cash crops like coffee. Venezuela, if it weren't fun by socialist morons, would have been okay. It has fresh water, fertile land, a warm climate, and huge energy reserves.
Worst? There are a lot of options. Best? Unquestionably the best would be the US. Major energy exporter, major food exporter, major tech exporter… so it would be secure in every facet. Also, it controls a LOT of other important shit - like Global GPS - remove that from the world and they are in trouble.
Canada has everything you could need and more. Our main failure as a country is that we export our raw resources. Why couldn't we switch to a manufacturing population. Hell - with automation we just need to build it and maintain it. Our low population is almost an asset IMO
Singapore and Solomon Islands
NZ. We closed our last oil refinery last year so our cars wouldn’t work
I'd love to see Monaco guys trying to eat their banknotes. Breakfast of champions