• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Agriculture, Food Supply is Vulnerable to Terrorism, Experts Say

Posted on: Friday, 19 August 2005, 00:00 CDT

Aug. 19--Terrorists aiming to spread fear, disrupt the economy and undermine confidence in the U.S. government could do all three with a focused strike on agriculture, experts said Thursday during a conference on the unthinkable -- a surprise attack on food.

If 180 attendees hadn't arrived in Sacramento already edgy about possibilities of another terror attack on U.S. soil, they left with an unsettling vision of all the ways it could happen again: introducing viruses to animals, adding poisoned additives to snack foods or crippling a transportation system to empty urban localities of their typical seven-day supply of food.

Raising the specter of a new attack by the al-Qaida terrorist group, California's director of homeland security, Matthew Bettenhausen, told food processors, farmers, academics and government officials, "They want to top 9/11. They want it to be spectacular."

With the approaching fourth anniversary of the terror attacks on New York City and the Pentagon, the phenomenon dubbed "agroterrorism" has attracted growing concern for its potential as a political weapon by both domestic and international terrorists.

The conference at the Hyatt Regency Sacramento had particular resonance here in the Central Valley, home to six of the nation's top nine farm counties and a leading exporter of food.

Already, local producers and distributors are taking precautions. Gary Gray, manager of quality systems at Blue Diamond Growers, said the almond distributor has added security cameras, employee badges and keyed entry devices at its Sacramento offices since the U.S. terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

U.S. customs agricultural inspector Tracy Encinas has seen the range of potential threats expand along the border in Nogales, Ariz., where 70 percent of winter produce enters the United States. "At the port level, there's been more of a focus on weapons of mass destruction and persons of interest," she said. "But now there's more of a focus on agriculture."

Speakers, including John Hoffman, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's top food and agricultural officer, said "food defense" has increasingly become a higher priority for funding, law enforcement bureaucracy and government planning.

"Most people do not associate terrorism with agriculture, but the threat is real," warned Tim Lester, special agent with the FBI's Sacramento office.

Agriculture -- including California's $27 billion industry, which supplies 60 percent of the nation's fruits and vegetables and 20 percent of its milk -- is considered especially vulnerable to attack as it increasingly becomes concentrated in fewer hands.

Panelists noted that five companies now process 80 percent of the nation's meat supply, offering potential for widespread disruption from a single event.

"There is a down side to concentration as it relates to security," said Dr. Jerry Gillespie, director of the University of California's Western Institute for Food Safety and Security in Davis.

Gillespie added that Americans have become so accustomed to safe and plentiful food that "taking that away for even a short period of time could have a very devastating effect."

The Davis institute sponsored the conference with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Chicago-based insurer Aon Corp.

-----

To see more of The Sacramento Bee, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.sacbee.com.

Copyright (c) 2005, The Sacramento Bee, Calif.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

Source: The Sacramento Bee

More News in this Category