Why 1 million pigs could be euthanized due to COVID-19-related supply chain issues - Business Insider

When coronavirus outbreaks shut down meat-processing plants across the US, animals headed here were suddenly stranded here.As time has gone on and plants haven't been able to operate, that's created a big backlog of pigs.Jayson Lusk:

You're literally talking about millions and millions of pigs that were intended to go to market but are still remaining on the farm.The backup at farms led to record-breaking meat prices and cleared-out shelves. The US was in the midst of a meat shortage.You start with the ethics of it, like, animals live and die to make your product, and then you get to the concentration of it. It's a pretty hairy beast.

In order to process all that meat, the industry is efficient and concentrated. Simply put, as many animals as possible move from the farm to the slaughterhouse as quickly as possible. When the system works, US meat prices are among the most affordable on the planet. But that efficiency becomes a problem in the face of COVID-19. For one, workers operate in tight quarters.They're in refrigerated environments with recirculating air.

Since mid-May, things have started getting better. Factories like Smithfield Sioux Falls have reopened with limited production and social-distancing measures. Euthanization of animals has slowed, and as a result, production and meat prices have started to stabilize. But what can we do so this doesn't happen again? One option is to rely more on smaller, vertically integrated farms.When you see a piece of meat in the grocery store, it's typically been touched by 15 or 20 different types of companies, and all of those companies are hyper-specialized and they operate at a really efficient scale.That's Anya. She owns Belcampo Farms, a vertically integrated meat company out in Northern California.

I’ll take them

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