May 13, 2020

Meat packers most vulnerable in beef supply chain during pandemic

The beef production system and the transportation industry are interdependent critical infrastructures, according to an interdisciplinary team of Kansas State University researchers, who developed a computer simulation that revealed beef supply chain vulnerabilities that need safeguarding especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The researchers evaluated which supply-chain components were more robust and which were not. They determined that meat-packing plants are the most vulnerable, the K-State News reported.

According to the research paper—titled "Developing an agent-based model to simulate the beef cattle production and transportation in southwest Kansas" and published in Physica A journal—disruptions in the cattle industry, especially in the beef-packing plants, will affect the transportation industry and together cause great economic harm.

The paper noted that the beef cattle industry contributes around $8.9 billion to the Kansas economy and employs more than 42,000 people in the state.

Caterina Scoglio, a professor and co-author of the published paper, said that since trucks are needed to move cattle, any disruption in either cattle production or transportation almost certainly would harm the regional economy.

Likewise, she said, packers "need to be considered as a critical point of a much longer supply chain, which needs specific attention to make sure it will not fail and can continue working".

"An important message is that after understanding the critical role of these packers, we need to decide how we could protect both them and the people who work there," Scoglio said.

"While the plants are a critical infrastructure and need to be protected, taking care of the health of the workers is very important. How can we design a production process that can be flexible and adaptable in an epidemic?"

The research project was supported by the National Science Foundation and focused on southwest Kansas. But since the cattle come from outside the region, the researchers acknowledge that interruptions may have larger national effects.