Investing in Maeotis would never produce enough for all our cities, and would cost so much I doubt it'd be a real alternative to imports. We'd do it for sure, though, at least now and then, but it wouldn't cut our requirements for imports.
Others are clearly as ignorant as yourself when suggesting that any patch of land has a theoretical maximum production capacity. There is no theoretical maximum production capacity, *especially* not in agriculture. You can always develop more productive breeds, invent better fertilizers, discover better crop management, etc. That they did not have the technical knowledge we have nowadays does not mean that everyone had access to the latest technology of the days either, some could not afford better tools or did not have access to training for better methods, for whatever reason. Dump enough cash, and people will be able to afford better tools or training, that's just how the world works. And honestly, what the hell are people investing in to manage to make a small rural region's income double, without increasing food production, when everyone there is working on farms? It'd be way more realistic if investments in rural increased production % less considerably, but that this allowed for higher food production levels. If rural lords had more power over their food production, they might be more tempted to make a trade out of it, instead of shipping it all out for free as most do.
If you are arguing that 100% is the maximum food production in-game at this time, though, then you are just pointing out the totally obvious thing that served as the basis of my critic.
If we are able to invest in radical new technology to improve our rural, then the gain from investment would be permanent though. If we then continue the line of thinking that there exist no maximum limit to food production (thanks for solving world hunger by the way) then we can constantly improve our regions to the point were they can provide the required food. Sure diminished returns would make that very expensive but if you take a very long term approach, or can't source food for import then people may well want to throw cash into making super rurals.
The thing we were trying to point out is that for the purpose of the game, rural technology is stagnate and can't be advanced further within the time frame, and in abstract terms everyone is assumed to have access to the best possible practise at 100%. Perhaps Tom would consider changing this, I'm not sure its ever been brought up.
