Screwworms and Exploding Grain: This Week’s Ag Disasters | Rising Anxieties

And one of them, and this is really big as far as the industry is concerned, is new world screw worm. This is their latest disease. You know, every year we have a new dreadful disease. And of course you will end up being the ones who will pay for it to get controlled. Controlled. This one is just in Mexico now, but it's getting closer every day. And they're a wreck. They really are. Uh, this is from Ag Daily. The growing outbreak of New World Screwworm in Mexico has triggered serious concerns for US Agriculture first detected in Chiapas, I hope I'm pronouncing that right, in November, 2024.

New World screw worm has now breached containment threshold, spreading more than 127 miles beyond the secondary buffer zone into was Oaxaca and Veracruz. This means that it's getting closer and closer to the US border, which, you know, like, diseases don't really respect borders.

I'll just take a quote here. The, the way that you control it, uh, or at least they think that you do, is to release sterile flies. I think that's sterile male flies, to control the wild screw worm populations. So there's all these screw worms out in the world, and they breed a whole bunch of other screw worms...

this whole world is so sick... that are sterile and then they mate with the screw worms who are out in the wild. And, and then that stops it though apparently it doesn't stop it. It has been the primary tool in keeping the pest at bay, this article says. Apparently it's not doing a great job.

The Panama facility, that's where they breed most of the, or maybe all of them, of these sterile screw worms, um, currently produces 100 million sterile flies per week. But with the outbreak advancing north, this is no longer enough to maintain the biological barrier between Mexico and the US.

What is the biological barrier? I mean, it's the border. It's a river, I guess. And they go on to talk about all the economic implications, all the dreadful things that are gonna happen. Nowhere in here is mentioned, you know, anything about what might happen to the animals, uh, other than in the way it would affect humans.

The economic implications are staggering. According to the USDA, a screw worm outbreak in Texas alone could cost $1.9 billion annually because it's home to 12 and a half million cattle and it holds 14% of the US herd, uh, we have a herd apparently. Treatment requires veterinary intervention, medication and added labor. Oh my God.

Like they would have to spend money to help treat these animals like. Does anybody care about the animals? Infected animals often lose weight or die, and mother cows may be unable to care for calves further increasing operational burdens. Ranchers may need more horses for inspection and handling, and they're also vulnerable to the screwworm.

So, you know, uh. It's bad. It's bad. And guess who's gonna pay for it? 'Cause they want, um, expanded facilities. They don't wanna just rely on these facilities in Panama, they want expanded facilities in the US and, even then, rebuilding control will take years. I have a second article about this 'cause everybody's talking about it.

This is from Hordes Dairyman, 'cause of course it also affects the dairy industry and they're a wreck as well. There is a border ban that you can't import cattle from, uh, Mexico at the moment. Do you hear about this on mainstream media? I was just gonna say, you don't really hear about this on mainstream media, but I realize I don't really listen to mainstream media much, so I'm not sure that's true.

Maybe it's all over the place, but it's really huge. It's rapid northward spread, it's now 700 miles south of the border. There's a Senate bill pending. The Stop Screw Worms Act. It has some like really stupid, uh, acronym Strengthening Tactics to Obstruct the Population of Screw Worms.

Stop Screw Worms Act. That was recently introduced. What are the chances of that not passing? Uh, finally this Congress will do something and you know, of course it will spend your money. That's what they wanna do. They would secure funding for a new US-based operation to provide the necessary quantity of these sterile flies.

Your tax money at work. Doesn't even talk about what kind of effect it has on the animals or how much they suffer or anything like that. It is a sick industry.

I know I have a dust problem. All right. This is a, another new problem. This isn't solely about animal agriculture. It's about agriculture in general, about grain.

I got this from Sentient Media, but actually it was, they mentioned that it was originally published on Investigate Midwest. Sky Chad was the writer. I know I have a dust problem. ADM repeatedly failed to prevent potentially deadly grain explosions. Um, last week we heard about people drowning in grain.

This week we're hearing about grain exploding. Apparently this is a big thing that everybody knows about. I didn't know about it. And grain, as I mentioned, is not only used for animal feed, but Archer Daniels Midland, which is the company that they're mostly talking about here, provides enormous amounts of grain that is raised, is raised for, um, for animal feed, and I think 30% this article says. And, uh, how one of the world's largest animal feed producers, Archer Daniels Midland, failed to implement crucial safety measures to grave consequences. This story repeats itself over and over again.

Apparently you can prevent the fact that grain produces all of this dust that then explodes and causes huge fires and explosions and deaths, and injuries. Terrible injuries. Who knew? You know, I don't know anything about processing grain. Like you have to learn so many things that you just didn't know in order to, uh, be an animal advocate.

Processing grain, this article points out, generates a highly explosive byproduct- dust. Industry guidelines recommend and experts encourage that companies install machines to capture airborne dust and routinely clean dusty areas. This is a very long article. I recommend you read it.

It outlines a number of different incidents in which these explosions have occurred, particularly at ADM facilities and how they could be prevented. It just costs money to do that. ADM is huge, huge, huge, huge. They make really a lot of money, but as this points out, quote, despite its vast resources and awareness of the risks, ADM has failed to prevent a series of recent grain explosions.

In total, one person has died and 15 employees and first responders have suffered life-changing injuries. And the injuries they describe. You know, when you hear like, oh, this many people were injured, you don't really know whether they like, stubbed a toe. We're talking about third degree burns and really, really dreadful injuries.

There have been government investigations. They have found that ADM mismanaged things, were responsible for the deaths. ADM just says, no, that's not true. ADMs North American headquarters in Decatur, Illinois exploded a section of that building. Um, two more explosions rocked the facility in 2023. OSHA found the same problems. Poor maintenance.

Poor maintenance. These are preventable injuries. 11 workers suffered third degree birds across their faces and bodies. And ADM is contesting the government finds. That they're willing to spend money on. Between 2018 and 2024, ADM had eight grain explosions.

Unbelievable. Unbelievable. These, this is, uh, like literal. Last week we were talking about people drowning in silos and at least there they had to like... there was work that had to be done to figure out how to prevent it. I mean, it was pretty simple. You just had to like seal the silos better. Here, like there's no question that these are preventable.

Everybody knows you have to clean up the dust. That the dust is constant and overwhelming. This has been going on for a century, uh, ADM has, has been dealing with this. In one incident, they allowed first responders to, like firefighters would, to douse a smoldering silo, which is apparently the worst possible thing that you can do. And, and caused a much, much worse explosion. So they like, it's, this is all preventable. Hate this industry.

The next thing I wanna talk about, and I admit I don't know as much about it as I should because a lot of it doesn't have to do with animal stuff, but you may have heard about the latest, um, Make America Healthy Again report. It was a huge report and it's been quite controversial and apparently quite controversial within the meat industry. I don't see why, but then, you know, I want the report to say everybody should stop eating meat 'cause it's, it's a highly processed food and it's, it's terrible for you. Um, but it didn't say that.

So I'm like, well, they got off. There's nothing in here really about the meat industry specifically, but they are very, very upset. Um, you can read the full report in the New York Times. I'm just gonna gonna read like an excerpt from it 'cause it covers a lot of different issues.

Not, not all of which are things that we necessarily, I mean, we care about it as humans and as citizens, but not necessarily as animal advocates.

The food American children are eating. It focuses a lot on children. The American food system is safe, but could be healthier. Yeah, no shit. Most American children's diets are dominated by ultra processed foods, high in added sugars, chemical additives, and saturated fats, while lacking sufficient intakes of fruits and vegetables.

And one thing that the industry probably doesn't like here is that this report actually supports this consumption of fruits and vegetables, and also supports subsidies for them. Every penny that goes to fruits and vegetables is a penny you're taking away from the pork industry. Quote, this modern diet has been linked to a range of chronic diseases, including obesity, type two diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and certain cancers.

I mean, you guys know all of this. Only you would also include meat. The excessive consumption of ultra processed foods has led to a depletion of essential micronutrients and dietary fiber while increasing the consumption of sugars and carbohydrates, which negatively affects overall health. Now, I, you know, I'm not gonna dispute this, like, just because I'm an animal addict, it doesn't mean I don't notice that like a lot of the cereals and, foods that the kids eat outside of animal foods are like total and complete crap. The really, really unfortunate thing is that the industry has managed to include, uh impossible and Beyond Burgers in that, which I think is insane 'cause they're better for you than meat. But, you know, I digress.

This report does not deal with that at all. Nearly 70% of an American child's calories today come from ultra processed foods, increased from zero a hundred years ago. That is really an interesting statistic. Many of which are designed to override satiety mechanisms and increase caloric intake. Ultra processed foods make up over 50% of the diets of pregnant and postpartum mothers.

Alright. I mean, the report is very, very long. I'm just grabbing that. That's kind of an introductory paragraph talking about like what the problems are. It doesn't really talk about meat at all as far as I can figure out, I can't say I read it in total detail. Um, but the pork industry, they're a wreck, they're a complete wreck.

Despite Maha Report implications, Statler, he's the president of the National Pork Producers Council says, US Pork Producers work to fill protein gap. It almost sounds as if they think that they, they were specifically criticized in this report, and that really makes me happy.

I really hope that that's how other people take this as well. So this guy, Statler, is quoted as saying like others, in farming and agriculture, we agree that nutritious, healthy, safe, and affordable protein from meat should be widely accessible so everyone can achieve the basic needs of a balanced diet. Filling our nation's protein gap... like is there a protein gap? That's their new line, that there's a protein gap. Filling our nation's protein gap is critical, especially for those focused on food insecurity and improving the health of our nation. Are they really this upset because the report is, is supporting the consumption of fruits and vegetables, including legumes? They're not, they're not criticizing the consumption of meat. It's so interesting. They feel very threatened. Then they go through, I'm not gonna read you like, like report on they, they talk about all of these studies that show how great pork is for you, including one that says pork is also a great option for infants who are transitioning to solid foods when babies first bite includes pork.

Oh my god. That's a sick world. Can you imagine you're excited because your baby's first bite is a dead pig. Anyway, and they say that farmer input was lacking from the Maha report. That it's misleading. But two of the other things that I noticed in the Maha Report, which I think might, um, be particularly upsetting them even though they were not being criticized really as directly at all.

One is the use of pesticides. They're really worried that their ability to raise these enormous amounts of feed crops, are gonna be threatened by, by criticism of their pesticides. And another was the fact that, uh, most nutrition information and research is being done by industry, not by government, which is really interesting that, um, people are bringing attention to that.

So, yeah, and the whole idea that, uh, a third thing I probably the most important, the idea that, um, even though there has been some improvement, providing subsidies to what are called specialty crops, which is such an insane term, uh, which include fruits and vegetables, of course. There should be a lot more.

And so overall, I guess there are some interesting threats to the meat industry here, but the way they're reacting just shows how used to they are to just being catered to all the time and they're upset and anything that upsets them makes me happy. Well, not anything. There could be things that they find upsetting that I would also find upsetting.

Alright. finally, this is a stupid article, but I just wanted to add it because it's from the UK it's from something called Farmer's Guardian. Vegan activists spying on farmers with drones. And the government was recently asked how it is protecting farmers from being spied on by vegans.

All right, well, it's about some farms, or you know, animal use facilities have been witnessing drones going over and apparently it's not illegal to use drones in the UK except under certain conditions. They have no idea what the conditions are. They're just saying, this is terrible.

This is terrible. This is terrible, and it has to be stopped. And there's no information in this article, which is why I said it was kind of a stupid article about what's legal and what isn't in, in the UK regarding using drones. But I just think it's fascinating because like, what are drones trying to do?

They're just trying to see what's happening. That's all. Like, like they're not arguing that they're taking this drone footage and faking things the way they do with undercover footage from animal rights activists who go into facilities. Now, they're just like, you know, God forbid anybody should take a photograph of what they're doing.

They really hate that, don't they? And that's one of the reasons their anxieties are rising this week. Thank you so much for joining me on my new little Rising Anxieties podcast. I hope you'll tune in and I hope you'll subscribe. If you're not subscribed on YouTube, please do so, even if you don't watch it on YouTube because it really helps us out.

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