Another Reason to Produce Your Own Food

I was talking with BlueTang today, and he mentioned the fact that there is an ongoing swine epidemic….not swine flue affecting humans, but a virus that affects swine, killing large numbers of them.

A quick Google search reveals this:

PED Headlines 11 April 2014
PED Headlines 11 April 2014

 

Now, does this concern you if you do NOT eat pork, bacon, ham, or sausage?

Why yes, it does.

Every pig not turned into food needs to be replaced in the would-be consumer’s diet. If I eat pork every day, then one day, I cannot or will not afford to buy more pork, I will start looking at alternatives. When I start to buy those alternatives, the supply and demand will shift, driving up prices of the replacement item.

Food prices are going to go up, folks. Soon. Maybe not a lot, but enough to notice. I don’t know about your life, but in mine, we already run pretty close to the edge. And while the prices increase quickly, they are ALWAYS slow to drop….if they ever do.

I just sold my last two “excess” breeder does from my rabbitry. After reading this, I’m thinking I probably should have kept them. Rabbit isn’t pork, but it also isn’t Soylent Green. And if you smoke rabbit, it CAN taste a bit like bacon...

 

On a slight tangent that actually works towards the same concern regarding food prices, I read something REAL scary in one of the articles from Reuters:

Smithfield Foods Inc, the world’s largest pork processor, suspended hog slaughter at its Tar Heel, North Carolina, plant on Friday because the spread of the Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus (PEDv) has tightened hog supplies, industry sources said….

The article goes on to say

..Smithfield, acquired last year by China’s Shuanghui International….

 

 

So the World’s Largest Pork Processor, located here in the United States, is now owned by a Chinese company?

 

The country that holds a large portion of our debt now also holds our bacon Owned By Chinaproduction? The little voice in my head just stately flatly, “Oh, shit.

I try not to be all tin-foil hat, but THIS makes me nervous….

 

So if you have any plans for stockpiling pork in the near future….grab a few picnic hams, pork butts, or pork loins…and, dare I say it,

 

Smoke `em if you got `em!

 

 

Peace,
db

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4 comments:

  1. And not to mention that Beef prices are already UP 19% this year. Now the EPA is going to force cattle ranchers to reduce their cows from farting Methane by 20%. The only way to do that is reduce the number of cows they have. Smart Government??? If that doesn’t work maybe the BLM will throw the Ranchers off grazing land….OH, Wait…
    (Put in 100 ft. of sweet taters and 25ft of okra today and picked a bucket of green beans and 4 cukes,Summer squash?Don’t ask.ARRRRR!!!Early Peaches are almost ready.)

  2. Yes, I saw the news about the Porcine Diahrrea Virus over at grannymiller.com blog. Truly scary especially since we didn’t have this until the Chineese came over to buy Smithfield. China has had this virus for a long time – part of the reason they are looking for new pork sources & they may have infected their new business.

  3. OK, I’m thinking “Guinea Pigs in a chicken tractor” no lawnmower required.
    Anyone with a backyard could do this.

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