9 ms·

Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. We need to re-open our food infrastructure ASAP.

by csense 6y ago

Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. We need to re-open our food infrastructure ASAP. This is really risky for workers, yes, they'll be exposing themselves to the virus. So let's double or triple the pay for the workers involved due to the hazards. Add generous survivors' pensions for the families of those who die or become disabled from COVID-19, as some certainly will if we send them into factories while the risks are there. Maybe we need a program to shuffle unemployed people who have already had COVID-19 into high-exposure jobs like meat plants. Or send in the troops and man the plants with military personnel. We need somebody to produce food even during a pandemic. Getting those food plants open before we run out of food needs to be a top priority!

gruez 6y ago
> Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. Is keeping meat processing plants closed really going to cause food shortages? Eating rice and beans isn't pleasant, but comparing it to starvation is hyperbolic.
- jerf 6y ago
  At scale, we can't necessarily just substitute things instantly like that. Do you think there's enough calorie-slack built into the rice & beans (& everything else) to supply the drop from animal sources? 'Cause I for one would be very, very surprised. Not to mention you're also assuming that rice and beans are unaffected... but very little if anything about these plant closures are specifically related to them being animal protein sources. Does no good to shrug and say "people should just be eating vegetarian anyhow" if the vegetarian supply line is also going to collapse.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    To expand on your point, even if the vegetarian protien supply chains aren't directly affected by COVID the way that the meat supply chain is, if everyone who eats meat must abruptly switch to alternative protein sources, do we imagine that there is an overproduction of such protein sources such that it can absorb the demand without driving prices out of reach of the poor?
  - gruez 6y ago
    >Do you think there's enough calorie-slack built into the rice & beans (& everything else) to supply the drop from animal sources? 'Cause I for one would be very, very surprised. Rice and beans is probably not the best example, it's just the stereotypical frugal food. What's more realistic would be corn and soybeans. Massive amounts of corn is used for ethanol production (which we probably don't need since oil is at an all time low), and massive amounts of soybeans is used for meat production (which we don't need because all the meat processing plants are shut down).
    - ip26 6y ago
      FWIW the corn fed to livestock or used for ethanol is usually field corn, which is generally considered inedible for humans. We eat sweet corn, which is only a tiny fraction of the USA corn crop.
      - AnimalMuppet 6y ago
        I'm pretty sure that field corn is perfectly edible for humans. The problem is that it doesn't taste as good as sweet corn, but it's not poisonous or anything. In fact, if you're starving, it probably tastes pretty good.
        trynewideas 6y ago
        Edible in the same sense as paper is technically edible, yes. Nutritionally valuable to humans? Only for a brief window — and with commercial processing, so we're back to "what if the food processing part of the chain fails due to the pandemic?"
        gruez 6y ago
        >Edible in the same sense as paper is technically edible, yes. Nutritionally valuable to humans? Only for a brief window Can you elaborate on that? It's not like you're eating leaves. Aren't all types of corn mostly starch that humans can digest?
        6y ago
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  In the depths of World War II Britain, where food was extremely short, civilians were given a weekly ration of about a pound of meat and half a pound of bacon. (For comparison, modern Americans eat about 2 pounds of meat a week, which I think includes bacon.) For better or worse, meat is considered an essential food. It would be disastrously, apocalyptically bad if it becomes unavailable.
- jandrewrogers 6y ago
  The rice and beans that are in the supply chain now were planted several months ago, based on projected demand when they were planted. These supply chains are all interconnected.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
chirau 6y ago
Why don't you go and work there? We'll give you triple the pay. You reckon everyone is willing to sacrifice health for money? What's the purpose of making money when you can't even spend it or might not even be there to enjoy it? Crisis has to be met with adjustment. This a pandemic, so don't just expect things to be normal. Things will have to change, whether that is where we source our food, how it is brought to us or even what we eat... something will have to change.
- jerf 6y ago
  Source from where? It's easy to apply your mental model of a supermarket to the supply chain... oh, chicken isn't available? We'll just go get some beef. That's not how it works at global scale. If chicken isn't available, there isn't necessarily anything else to pick up the slack. There certainly won't be if other supply chains break too because we neglect them all, one-by-one, thinking something else can just pick up the slack. Food is a necessity. It's arguably the only necessity being truly threatened by our reaction. It means that, if necessary, the "adjustment" that should be made is that people may be pressed into work by government force if necessary to keep it flowing. Anybody who is necessary, not just "plant workers". (Most likely starting with the National Guard and the military, if necessary.) Food supply chain breakdowns are not an inconvenience. They are an existential threat, and csense is completely correct; it is 100% a greater existential threat than the pandemic, if it gets going. In fact, the pandemic isn't even an existential threat on the same scale; the absolute worst case possibilities anyone ever posited for the coronavirus are still childs play next to civilization-scale food shortage. Now, I do not personally have a good bead on how big this threat is right now. There's a world of difference between Farmer Bob had to dump a few thousand gallons of milk and saw a chance to turn it into a photo op and/or blame some other problem he had on the coronavirus, and entire months' worth of production going down the drain across the industry. I do not have a good bead on whether this is a drummed-up talking point or a legit crisis. However, it is important that we find out for real, because if there is a real problem here, it can rapidly dwarf the coronavirus itself.
- stagger87 6y ago
  I'm not sure what the point of your first paragraph is. I'm sure a ridiculous number of people would be willing to work at a rendering plant for $48-60/hr right now.
fwipsy 6y ago
Food production is already an essential business. Tyson's plant got shut down because they weren't adequately protecting their workers (see https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/us/tyson-waterloo-iowa-plant-employees-coronavirus/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/us/tyson-waterloo-iowa-plant-...) We're a long way from "100%" chance of starving to death.
mumblemumble 6y ago
> Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. This is beyond hyperbolic. Coronavirus is actually happening. Not having any food isn't, and we're not anywhere close to that point yet, either. If anything, the big food problem right now is that it's piling up in warehouses because we can no longer rely so much on restaurants to buy it up and then throw half of it into the trash anymore. It sucks for Tyson that they can't make their products without bringing humans into too close a contact with each other. But I'm pretty sure that the lines that processes beans and rice doesn't need quite so much direct human involvement, so, as long as the virus doesn't learn how to infect inanimate objects, I'm pretty sure we'll be able to keep eating.
- jandrewrogers 6y ago
  The supply chain for rice and beans can't double its capacity because we suddenly have a meat shortage, we don't have vast amounts of raw material, logistical, and processing capacity just sitting around. If you need to massively increase the amount of beans in the supply chain, you'll need someone to plant them first and so on.
  - Turing_Machine 6y ago
    > The supply chain for rice and beans can't double its capacity because we suddenly have a meat shortage Yes, it takes 3-5 months to bring rice to harvest, assuming you have a suitable climate for growing it in the first place (which most of the United States does not). Beans are more forgiving with respect to climate, but they also take 3-4 months to grow. And, as you say, you can't suddenly turn a meat packing and distribution operation into one for rice. They're different in almost every respect.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  What happens when everyone who eats meat switches to rice and beans? The price of rice and beans goes through the roof, and millions of people can no longer afford to eat rice and beans. What do they eat? Further, the food (and other inventory) piling up in warehouses is itself a major problem because it drives up storage costs beyond what those owning the inventory can pay, and those companies go bankrupt. We can sustain some bankruptcy in our supply chains, but at a certain point, it becomes unstable and it cascades. Everything is interconnected.

by csense 6y ago

gruez 6y ago

> Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. Is keeping meat processing plants closed really going to cause food shortages? Eating rice and beans isn't pleasant, but comparing it to starvation is hyperbolic.

jerf 6y ago
At scale, we can't necessarily just substitute things instantly like that. Do you think there's enough calorie-slack built into the rice & beans (& everything else) to supply the drop from animal sources? 'Cause I for one would be very, very surprised. Not to mention you're also assuming that rice and beans are unaffected... but very little if anything about these plant closures are specifically related to them being animal protein sources. Does no good to shrug and say "people should just be eating vegetarian anyhow" if the vegetarian supply line is also going to collapse.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  To expand on your point, even if the vegetarian protien supply chains aren't directly affected by COVID the way that the meat supply chain is, if everyone who eats meat must abruptly switch to alternative protein sources, do we imagine that there is an overproduction of such protein sources such that it can absorb the demand without driving prices out of reach of the poor?
- gruez 6y ago
  >Do you think there's enough calorie-slack built into the rice & beans (& everything else) to supply the drop from animal sources? 'Cause I for one would be very, very surprised. Rice and beans is probably not the best example, it's just the stereotypical frugal food. What's more realistic would be corn and soybeans. Massive amounts of corn is used for ethanol production (which we probably don't need since oil is at an all time low), and massive amounts of soybeans is used for meat production (which we don't need because all the meat processing plants are shut down).
  - ip26 6y ago
    FWIW the corn fed to livestock or used for ethanol is usually field corn, which is generally considered inedible for humans. We eat sweet corn, which is only a tiny fraction of the USA corn crop.
    - AnimalMuppet 6y ago
      I'm pretty sure that field corn is perfectly edible for humans. The problem is that it doesn't taste as good as sweet corn, but it's not poisonous or anything. In fact, if you're starving, it probably tastes pretty good.
      - trynewideas 6y ago
        Edible in the same sense as paper is technically edible, yes. Nutritionally valuable to humans? Only for a brief window — and with commercial processing, so we're back to "what if the food processing part of the chain fails due to the pandemic?"
        gruez 6y ago
        >Edible in the same sense as paper is technically edible, yes. Nutritionally valuable to humans? Only for a brief window Can you elaborate on that? It's not like you're eating leaves. Aren't all types of corn mostly starch that humans can digest?
        6y ago
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
In the depths of World War II Britain, where food was extremely short, civilians were given a weekly ration of about a pound of meat and half a pound of bacon. (For comparison, modern Americans eat about 2 pounds of meat a week, which I think includes bacon.) For better or worse, meat is considered an essential food. It would be disastrously, apocalyptically bad if it becomes unavailable.
jandrewrogers 6y ago
The rice and beans that are in the supply chain now were planted several months ago, based on projected demand when they were planted. These supply chains are all interconnected.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

chirau 6y ago

Why don't you go and work there? We'll give you triple the pay. You reckon everyone is willing to sacrifice health for money? What's the purpose of making money when you can't even spend it or might not even be there to enjoy it? Crisis has to be met with adjustment. This a pandemic, so don't just expect things to be normal. Things will have to change, whether that is where we source our food, how it is brought to us or even what we eat... something will have to change.

jerf 6y ago
Source from where? It's easy to apply your mental model of a supermarket to the supply chain... oh, chicken isn't available? We'll just go get some beef. That's not how it works at global scale. If chicken isn't available, there isn't necessarily anything else to pick up the slack. There certainly won't be if other supply chains break too because we neglect them all, one-by-one, thinking something else can just pick up the slack. Food is a necessity. It's arguably the only necessity being truly threatened by our reaction. It means that, if necessary, the "adjustment" that should be made is that people may be pressed into work by government force if necessary to keep it flowing. Anybody who is necessary, not just "plant workers". (Most likely starting with the National Guard and the military, if necessary.) Food supply chain breakdowns are not an inconvenience. They are an existential threat, and csense is completely correct; it is 100% a greater existential threat than the pandemic, if it gets going. In fact, the pandemic isn't even an existential threat on the same scale; the absolute worst case possibilities anyone ever posited for the coronavirus are still childs play next to civilization-scale food shortage. Now, I do not personally have a good bead on how big this threat is right now. There's a world of difference between Farmer Bob had to dump a few thousand gallons of milk and saw a chance to turn it into a photo op and/or blame some other problem he had on the coronavirus, and entire months' worth of production going down the drain across the industry. I do not have a good bead on whether this is a drummed-up talking point or a legit crisis. However, it is important that we find out for real, because if there is a real problem here, it can rapidly dwarf the coronavirus itself.
stagger87 6y ago
I'm not sure what the point of your first paragraph is. I'm sure a ridiculous number of people would be willing to work at a rendering plant for $48-60/hr right now.

fwipsy 6y ago

Food production is already an essential business. Tyson's plant got shut down because they weren't adequately protecting their workers (see https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/us/tyson-waterloo-iowa-plant-employees-coronavirus/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/us/tyson-waterloo-iowa-plant-...) We're a long way from "100%" chance of starving to death.

mumblemumble 6y ago

> Three percent chance coronavirus will kill us. One hundred percent chance not having any food will kill us. This is beyond hyperbolic. Coronavirus is actually happening. Not having any food isn't, and we're not anywhere close to that point yet, either. If anything, the big food problem right now is that it's piling up in warehouses because we can no longer rely so much on restaurants to buy it up and then throw half of it into the trash anymore. It sucks for Tyson that they can't make their products without bringing humans into too close a contact with each other. But I'm pretty sure that the lines that processes beans and rice doesn't need quite so much direct human involvement, so, as long as the virus doesn't learn how to infect inanimate objects, I'm pretty sure we'll be able to keep eating.

jandrewrogers 6y ago
The supply chain for rice and beans can't double its capacity because we suddenly have a meat shortage, we don't have vast amounts of raw material, logistical, and processing capacity just sitting around. If you need to massively increase the amount of beans in the supply chain, you'll need someone to plant them first and so on.
- Turing_Machine 6y ago
  > The supply chain for rice and beans can't double its capacity because we suddenly have a meat shortage Yes, it takes 3-5 months to bring rice to harvest, assuming you have a suitable climate for growing it in the first place (which most of the United States does not). Beans are more forgiving with respect to climate, but they also take 3-4 months to grow. And, as you say, you can't suddenly turn a meat packing and distribution operation into one for rice. They're different in almost every respect.
throwaway894345 6y ago
What happens when everyone who eats meat switches to rice and beans? The price of rice and beans goes through the roof, and millions of people can no longer afford to eat rice and beans. What do they eat? Further, the food (and other inventory) piling up in warehouses is itself a major problem because it drives up storage costs beyond what those owning the inventory can pay, and those companies go bankrupt. We can sustain some bankruptcy in our supply chains, but at a certain point, it becomes unstable and it cascades. Everything is interconnected.