[hal]

Almost forgot...

When you get a chance, do a search on the internet for "Ug99" and read up on not only what the virus does to the cereal plants, but the fact that it has changed and mutated into a more virulent strain capable of causing 100% crop yield loss in areas it hits. There are genetically engineered strains of wheat that are resistant to Ug99, but in nations that have outlawed genetic engineering seedstock, such an event as a major Ug99 spread affecting up to 80% of world wide stocks will definitely be a massively historical event.

In fact? If you wanted to be cute about it, you could even pick up a used copy of the Millenial Project from Amazon.com and read up on some of the floating production centers in the first portion of the book. The author describes how seaweed can be used as a secondary source of protein. That plus aquaculture might be a new "wave" of food production for your cyberpunk campaign. Some megacorporations my be heavily into food production, and since they could possibly amass political power based on their production, could give you some inspiration for your cyberpunk campaign.

One of the cyberpunk campaigns I ran involved research into transplanting brains and spinal cords between one ape into another. The idea was to spur research that could be used for the process on humans. While not the path to immortality, it did permit people with enough wealth, to insure a longer life - at the expense of some poor (literally) schmuck. Imagine the kind of horror you could implement in with your campaign where life truly is cheap - to those with the money and depravity.