|
PLEASANT HILL, Mo. -- West Missouri farm country has no shortage of livestock and rolling hills, but terrorism targets seem few and far between. No tall buildings. No well-known landmarks.
The nearest Manhattan: It's in Kansas.
"Out here things are still pretty quiet," cattle rancher Rod Findley proudly declared this week as he finished feeding his Hereford heifers in an early-morning fog. "I would think a terrorist would be a little out of place around here."
While the threat of terrorism clearly hangs over urban areas, a growing concern about an attack on the U.S. food supply is bringing more attention from law enforcement to rural America and farms like Findley's.
This harvest season the U.S. Department of Agriculture has produced a list of recommended security steps for farmers, from protecting fence perimeters to safeguarding chirping chicks.
And the recent E. coli outbreak has underscored how quickly contaminated food can impact people's lives and shake America's faith in agriculture.
While food and agriculture account for 18 percent of U.S. employment and produce $140 billion in annual U.S. revenue, farm security has traditionally been quite lax. Typically, little more than making sure the corral gate is latched.
This year, the Illinois Department of Agriculture has spent $6.5 million to improve food safety--hardly a blip when compared to the billions of dollars directed toward airport and highway security, but it's a 25 percent increase from five years ago. The state also is creating a database of all the agriculture facilities in Illinois so authorities can notify farms in specific areas if a problem ever arose.
"The threat from agroterrorism may not be one you recognize," FBI Deputy Director John Pistole said at a symposium this week in Kansas City, where about 1,000 farmers, police officers, scientists and economists gathered to discuss better ways to protect agriculture.
"But the threat is real," he said. "And the impact could be devastating."
The recent E. coli outbreak from spinach, while not intentional, offers a glimpse of such devastation, Pistole said. Nearly 200 people have become sick and at least one person has died from the tainted spinach, and the negative economic impact could linger.
But imagine an outbreak that affects not only spinach but also such products as beef, chicken or corn. Then imagine terrorists are behind it. Such a massive attack not only would sicken more people, it could permanently rattle confidence here and abroad in American agriculture, said Greg Pompelli, a USDA economist.
Five years after the Sept. 11 attacks, agriculture's enormous importance to the economy undoubtedly makes it an appealing target to someone wanting to harm the United States, but the industry's significance and robustness creates plenty of good news for Americans, too, Pompelli said. For example, about 25 percent of food that makes it onto U.S. plates is not eaten, meaning there is plenty to go around if supply is cut because of a large mandatory destruction of livestock. And unlike in many other countries, there is great crop diversity.
"Staple crops--like corn, wheat, soybeans and oats--are grown in more than two-thirds of counties" of the United States, Pompelli said, explaining that this lessens the chance that one region's economy could be decimated.
"Even some fresh produce--apples, tomatoes and peaches--are spread broadly, with a third of all counties growing these."
There are numerous points on food's journey from field to fork that are vulnerable to a would-be terrorist. The pork supply, for example, could be harmed by driving a truck full of sick pigs past several farms, suggested David Kaplan, director of the USDA's emergency and domestic programs. Or terrorists might attempt something further down the food chain, such as poisoning apples at a grocery store.
Pistole pointed to U.S. agriculture information found in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks as proof that there is intent to disrupt the food supply.
"The bottom line is that agriculture, just like buildings, bridges and tunnels, is a critical infrastructure in need of defense," he said.
|
|
