(NBC) American meat processing plants have been hit hard by coronavirus. Nearly 20 factories have been forced to close, at least temporarily, because of outbreaks among employees. And that has some consumers worried about what this could mean at the grocery store.
Shoppers all over the country may soon find their grocery store meat shelves looking a little bit different. By Monday morning, it may be harder to find your favorite cuts of meat.
The big box-chain Costco announced they are limiting beef, pork and poultry purchases to three items per customer starting Monday. It comes as the pandemic hits parts of the critical food supply chain and disrupts the way meat ends up in your grocery store.
David Anderson is a livestock economist and professor at Texas A&M. He said consumers could see shortages for quite some time. “You’ll see a meat case that doesn’t have maybe all the selections it’s had in the past, and that’s just simply because we’re producing less meat. Because of this, this packing plant, log jam.”
The CDC reported COVID-19 outbreaks in meat processing plants in 19 states with nearly 5,000 coronavirus cases and 20 deaths among workers.
President Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to keep plants open, calling them “critical infrastructure.” But the union that represents workers said if sick employees feel compelled to go back to work, plants may be forced to close again.
Marc Perrone is the president of United Food and Commercial Workers. He said, “If you want a safe and secure food supply, you have to have a safe and secure workforce.”
Closed meat-packing facilities are creating bottlenecks for farmers who can’t afford to keep all this excess livestock.
Paul Defoor of the Texas Cattle Feeders Association said many ranchers ready to send their cattle to market can’t. “That economic pain that farmers and ranchers are going to experience is going to be with us for a while,” he said. “There’s no doubt about that.”
And no doubt consumers will feel it as well at the supermarket and on the dinner table.
With a limited supply, the cost of meat is now up about 20% and then there’s another issue: shoppers said that they have been trying to limit their visits to crowded grocery stores because it’s crowded. But now, with limited meat, they may have to make more visits, which is the last thing anyone wants to do at this time of coronavirus.
The USDA report for March indicates there were about 500 million pounds of beef in cold storage which experts say is basically a week’s worth of production. So it’s not a huge buffer given the demand for meat in the U.S.
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