College guarding food supply from terrorism

By Duncan Mansfield
Associated Press

The University of Tennessee is creating a new center to train communities and farmers in protecting the nation’s food supply from terrorists.

Funded with a $2 million grant from the Department of Homeland Security, the Center for Agriculture and Food Security and Preparedness will address safeguards that can be applied across the agricultural spectrum — from crops to dairies to meat processors, UT officials announced Monday.

“We will be training industry folks, in particular, to assess their own facilities for vulnerability to someone coming in and intentionally contaminating their product,” said Sharon Thompson, center director.

“Then we take it to the next step — what they can do to harden those targets and actually move into a prevention perspective,” she said.

Every producer will have their own problems and solutions, she said. Instructors in the three-day courses will try to offer practical suggestions “because we know that an individual farmer can’t afford to do everything.”

“It may not be the things you would just guess, such as bigger fences around a facility,” Thompson said. Rather the focus might be on preventing contamination to the final product.

“I don’t want to generalize. It really varies from facility to facility. That is why we are really trying to teach folks to do this on their own, secure their own facility (and) their own community.”

Trial runs of the classes are planned this year in sessions in Tennessee, New Mexico and California.

The program will roll out nationally next year. Some 34 sessions will be offered around the country, free to participants. UT included representatives from New Mexico, California, Virginia, Iowa and Louisiana on its training development team to broaden its scope.

John Shipkowski, Tennessee’s deputy director for homeland security, noted that concerns about the nation’s food supply have moved beyond accidental contamination.

“We are now in a world where we’ve got to worry about potential adversaries deliberately targeting the agricultural system,” he said. “That threat requires a new breed of professionals to educate industry, assess vulnerability and come up with ways to mitigate those vulnerabilities.”

The potential impact couldn’t be much greater. “This will affect every American, as long as they are still eating,” said UT Veterinary Dean Michael Blackwell. The center is part of the university’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

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