William FosterBased on the course material, examine the pote.docx
- 1. William Foster Based on the course material, examine the potential effects of agroterrorism, as a subset of biological terrorism, on the United States agricultural sector and economy. How significant a threat do you view agroterrorism as broader subset of biological terrorism? Agroterrorism what exactly is it. Well it is defined as an “intentional introduction of a plant or animal disease with the purpose of causing monetary losses, creating fear, and/or undermining social stability”. (Bergeron 2011; Monke 2006) Based on this definition it looks like that agroterrorism in basic terms is when something is intentionally brought into an organism that will cause bodily harm to others. By doing this it would cause mass panic. The agriculture and food industry are something that the United States needs to continue stability and life. There is so much revenue that is generated from these industries and introducing a weapon like this would cause many issues. Typically the main threats that came to food was diseases and pests that are accidentally introduced to the food supplies. Introducing a bioterrorism weapon like that to the food supply would cause much hysteria throughout the United States. Maybe even across the world. We need food to survive and so on. “The goal of agroterrorism is not specifically the death of plants and animals, but rather an agroterrorism event is an avenue to undermine consumer confidence, cause social turmoil and create a host of other concerns.” (Stirrup 2007) With this being said if the consumer has no confidence in what they are selling and the
- 2. crops that they are planting damaged in a way that they would not be consumed the consumer would then loose funds that they need to survive. With that as well tampering with the nations food supply would impact the publics feelings of certain consumers food chain and cause many issues. The threat of agroterrorism is a widespread prospective event that may require a vast knowledge base; extensive resources and a fundamental understanding of emergency management response. With all of this being said I do believe that it is significant enough to be considered a way that many people could attack the nation because sometimes things that introduced to plants or animals can go undetected for different amounts of time. Monke, J. 2006. CRS report for Congress: Agroterrorism: Threats and preparedness. (CRS Report for Congress RL32521).Retrieved from the Congressional Research Service website: http://www.cnie.org/NLE/CRSreports/06Sep/RL32521.pdf Monke, J. 2006. CRS report for Congress: Agroterrorism: Threats and preparedness. (CRS Report for Congress RL32521).Retrieved from the Congressional Research Service website: http://www.cnie.org/NLE/CRSreports/06Sep/RL32521.pdf Anthony Taboas Agroterrorism is one of the most overlooked and yet most
- 3. dangerous forms of terrorism. When people think about terrorists they don't think about having the food supply becoming contaminated. People tend to think about bombs, guns and chemicals and that really starts to rally the fear from within. When talks of agroterrorism start that could be something that could cripple a nation from the inside if not caught quickly and effectively. The US exports over 150 billion dollars a year in agricultural trade (USDA.gov, 2016). This shows that a major part of the United State’s economy falls through agriculture. If there is an agroterrorism attack this could severely damage that economy. If the livestock gets infected that could result in either contaminated products or having to lose all that livestock at the hands of a terrorist attack and could cause massive loss in finances. This could affect job growth and wages for people living in the United States. Aside from the economic issues that this cause there is also the fact that people could start to develop dangerous sicknesses caused by eating contaminated foods. This could vary as minor as diarrhea or vomiting to potentially even death if the contamination is severe enough. This could cause casualties and in a halt in progress if enough people are infected. By combining the trade issues with the sick people and this could have catastrophic consequences on the nation as a whole. This will also cause mass fear. The swine flu epidemic, mad cow disease, and bird flu could all take forms of agroterrorism. When these diseases had their moment under the spotlight the entire nation was talking about and was fearing that anyone could be infected with it. This causes paranoia within society and makes people very uneasy about eating or drinking any water. Agroterrorism is by far one of the most dangerous forms of terrorism. It has so many different levels of damage that it can cause and it really only takes a few bad people in different parts of the country to greatly affect the whole nation if their attack is successful. I also is not that difficult if someone wanted to create an attack. As quoted by “There's a huge turnover in a
- 4. labor force - it's quite easy for someone who wanted to do this to find a way into a processing plant or any segment of a food system.” (Jones, 2007). The agroterrorism threat is something that is protected but is way more vulnerable than the majority of the public knows or would like to know. USDA.gov. (2016, August 15). Agricultural Trade. Retrieved December 08, 2016, from https://www.ers.usda.gov/data- products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the- essentials/agricultural-trade/ Jones, J. (2007, November 28). Agroterrorism: Preventing a Silent Attack. Retrieved December 08, 2016, from http://www.govtech.com/featured/Agroterrorism-Preventing-a- Silent-Attack.html