Could Ireland survive without importing anything?

Whats that saying -we're all just meals from revolution..

When there were fuel truck strikes in the UK a few years back the big fear was no fuel -no trucks -and the supermarkets shut down , no business carries stocks anymore , so you need to get grain to the flour mills , flour to the bakeries, bread to the supermarkets, and all staff need transport, as well as each business needing power ..

Fortunately we don't have as many ambient firearms as in the US.

This is the most interesting thread After Hours has had for about 3 years.

To answer the OP,

Of course we'd survive.

It'd be utter sh*te and a miserable existence, but we'd survive.

There's a vast difference between survive and thrive.

There is a mountain of beef n sheep n milk products. A pile of fish. Loads of whiskey. Loads of clothes. Ireland is not a cold country..so a couple of jumpers n a hat indoors in the winter. I'd say we'd band together fairly well. Initially we'd be grand from all the stocks we have and from a few years on we would have adapted ..no problem. We don't grow much wheat or vegetables but we'd up production. We would be basically living like our grandparents n probably better off!

There are 5 million sheep slaughtered a year in ireland alone. That's a sheep and a fleece for everyone in the audience.

Turf powered hospitals? Within a generation we'd be back to industrial age standards of living. We have so much stuff but no means to replace / repair it indefinitely.

Purely back of an envelope using figures pulled from Google but the question intrigued me so I took a shot at answering it:

Google says there are 292 calories in 100 grams of Lamb and that the mature weight of ewes is 80 – 100kgs.

If we assume every part of the animal is used (bones used to make broth, we're eating eyeballs, tongue, offal all used etc.) and take a conservative estimate of 50kgs of edible material per animal that works out at 46,000 calories per animal.

At 2,500 calories a day (well above anyone's starving level), that's 58.4 days of food.

If it got to the stage of not being able to import anything, I imagine we would not be keeping the data centres open for too long. Huge power saving there and their power storage would allow us to smooth our wind energy. I could happily power my house with my few solar panels - maybe not hoover so often, but would be able to keep the car going for small journeys for at least some of the year.

I would also allow the neighbours access to some ground for growing their own veg, or increase my own production and use surplus to barter/trade.

Did you mean to quote me?

Social order in the cities would be a problem as much of what they are used to would be gone and rationing would have to be introduced. You are right too that the loss of much fossil fuel derived fertilizer and imported fuel would impact on the volume of production. However, other sources cold come into play if they wern't exported i.e. gas, veg oil diesel HVO, seaweed etc. I am not saying they would replace totally our dependence on FF but essential services could still run. Still we would be in a much better position than most other Western Nations.

Sheep can't even cook properly.

be great.
first thing is we’d all need to eat more meat and dairy. Two wonderful foods that thankfully we produce in abundance thanks to our climate. We could well get by on these until we got serious about supporting our market garden sector to produce suitable fruit and veg in larger quantities. It’s important to remember though that something like 70% of our land isn’t suitable for crops so beef and dairy would still prevail as major food studs.

I’d say fuel rationing would have to happen immediately so it’s reserved for food production and powering essential services like hospitals

Strange food problems would pop up, like we produce loads of wheat but there’s essentially no commercial milling happening so flour and porridge would be scarse.

You're looking at 30kg (including offal) per sheep at 1/2 kg a day....60 days. But then you have the 1.8 million cattle slaughtered per year giving 550 million kgs of beef giving another 220 days at 1/2 kg a day. Pigs would be 3.3 million or 80 days at 1/2kg. 100 million chickens give another 60 days. That's 60+220+80+60= 420 days of 500g meat for 5 million people.

And it sure wouldn't be 5m people for very long. Once supermarkets run dry in the first week(??), then 95% of the population will be completely fupped. Sure, you might have a few potatoes, tomatoes and a bit of lettuce growing in the back garden but good luck with that keeping you going until nationwide food distribution is sorted from the - presumably now nationalised - main food producers in the country. It's Mad Max: Fury Road time after the first couple of weeks.

…been there done that, interesting country but not exactly democratic nor wealthy and healthy for most….

Now all you need is a chance to use them.

How many horses, carts and bicycles are there in the country? We'd be a minimum of a couple of years waiting for even a few horses, who knows how to make cartwheels now? Though maybe recycled car wheels might work, and opening a bicyle factory would be a great idea, but where would the metal come from?

This

Lawlessness, famine and killings in a matter of weeks.

Assuming any oil reserves stored overseas would be seized by wherever they're stored (wouldn'tblame them either tbh). Whatever you have in the tank and whatever you're willing to pay/fight for at the local forecourt is all you're getting.

Assume every home heating tank will be raided almost instantly as well!

Big lol at the "we'll just have steak and milk", how does a modern farmer reliant on diesel power for everything do anything without fuel? Genuine question, does everyone have a donkey and cart on standby? Do we have that many donkeys and carts? There'll be fights over them as well!

Can't go back to everything non mechanised at the flick of a switch, be like asking someone at Space X to work on a Saturn V!

Do they keep the gold in with the toilet rolls?

You would need to get in with an old-style traveler (used to living outside the system ) and an old-style farmer who was still using horses until the 70s and only got pumped water and electricity in the 70s so they might be ancient. Still, they have the old-school knowledge of how to do it without modern machinery. The third member of the tribe would be the kind that can make or fix anything and has a shed full of bits of everything.

Then you might survive.

How would you get cash out?