Canned Food Demand Soars and No COVID in Livestock
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson with your Agribusiness Update.
**Shelf-stable foods such as canned peaches and pears have seen demand leap during this pandemic with the head of the California Canning Peach Association saying retail demand the past month has been "unprecedented."
Processors have changed their operations to replenish depleted store shelves and ship products quickly to retail customers.
School districts are using fruit cups in the "grab and go" school meals they provide to students.
**There is no evidence livestock or livestock food products can carry COVID-19 or transmit it to humans, according to Gregg Hanzlicek, director of production animal investigations at Kansas State’s Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory.
He tells agweb.com, producers are aware there is a DIFFERENT strain of coronavirus that IS associated with neonatal diarrhea, and another we think is associated with cattle respiratory disease.
But, he adds, coronaviruses are very species-specific, and there’s no indication livestock can be carriers of COVID-19 or infect humans.
https://www.agweb.com/article/can-livestock-transmit-covid-19-humans?mkt/
**More packing plants are being impacted by the coronavirus pandemic.
Tyson Foods has suspended operations at its pork processing plant in Columbus Junction, Iowa after more than two dozen workers became infected with COVID-19.
Tyson Foods CEO Noel White tells agrimarketing.com, the closure is out of an abundance of caution and to minimize the impact on the company's overall production. Tyson is diverting that livestock supply to other Tyson pork plants.
https://www.agrimarketing.com/s/129777
