A May report from CoBank, which specializes in serving rural America, warns that meat supplies in grocery stores could shrink as much as 35 percent, prices could spike 20 percent and the impact could become even “more acute later this year” as the knock-on effects on the U.S. agriculture supply chain are felt.
With an April 28 executive order encouraging meat plants to reopen, the Trump administration has said the food supply must be weighted equally with safety. Over the past month, more than half of the 30 meat processing plants that had shuttered because of the coronavirus have reopened.
Over the past month, the number of infections tied to three of the country’s biggest meat processors — Tyson Foods, Smithfield Foods and JBS — has gone from just over 3,000 to more than 11,000.
In Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota, coronavirus cases linked to meat workers represent 18, 20 and 29 percent of the states’ total cases.
Many plants that have reopened are operating at reduced capacity, either because of widespread absences or to reduce the number of workers on a shift to allow for social distancing. Closures have affected 45,000 workers.
The recent closures have cascaded through local economies, as farmers who supply plants are left with nowhere to take their animals. The National Pork Producers Council estimates that current plant capacities are creating backlogs of 170,000 hogs a day.
“These hogs will eventually stay on farms too long and grow too large to be accepted by harvest facilities. It is estimated that up to 10,069,000 market hogs will need to be euthanized” – READ MORE
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