The animal agriculture and meat community certainly weathered its fair share of “business disruptions” throughout 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and related shutdowns, but additional operational challenges continue to pop up that threaten the security of our food supply. As a significant part of the food chain, the meat industry is indeed essential. That means we all have an important responsibility in ensuring the continuity of our operations.

Over the past few weeks, several events have caught my eye that have presented different obstacles to several companies. While only one of these issues has been directly tied to animal rights activism, any of these tactics could be adopted by activists or others who’d like to see disruptions in the U.S. food supply chain. Of course, most are well aware of the cyber-attack on JBS that had global ramifications. However, you might not have heard that a plant in Texas was shut down and evacuated for a period due to a bomb threat. Or, that animal rights and environmental activists in England recently used trucks, beacons and bamboo towers with people locked into them to stop workers from accessing four McDonald’s distribution centers.

While the JBS cyber-attack was quickly resolved, many were gravely concerned about the potential impact on the meat supply and food costs. Across the pond, the “McDestruction” protest blocked all four distribution centers for a combined total of 96 hours (according to the activist group), forcing at least one restaurant to temporarily close because they could not get necessary supplies.

Activists here in the U.S. were publicly cheering for both incidents, as they see anything that makes animal protein production more difficult as a victory — despite any repercussions for food security and affordability. In fact, raising the cost of animal protein is a key goal and I’m concerned that we’ll continue to see activists disrupting plants by any means necessary, whether that is chaining themselves to equipment and blocking off entrances like we’ve seen them do previously, or adopting new strategies such as cyber-attacks. In this instance, it won’t be a financial ransom they’re after, but rather a demand for companies to “go vegan” to bring the attack to an end.

I know I am far from the only one saying this, but I’d like to add my voice to the chorus of those calling for all of us in the animal agriculture community to continue recognizing the critical nature of our operations. Now is the time to invest considerably in both security measures and continuity planning.

Business disruptions coming from all angles — are you prepared?

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