Top-shelf meats such as filet mignon have dropped to their lowest prices in a decade as steakhouses across the country are shut down due to nationwide lockdowns.
The coronavirus pandemic has seen the value of prime meats typically sold in restaurants and steakhouses plunge nearly 40 percent to a decrease in demand.
At the same time the cost of simpler meats like ground beef and ribeyes have surged as customers flock to stores and stock up food to wait out quarantine orders.
‘The March 20 to April 17 period saw price increases, but they were more muted. Tenderloins, typically bought at restaurants, plummeted,’ Gary Morrison, a reporter who tracks the meat industry at commodity research firm Urner Barry, said to CBS.
Worries over the country’s meat supply chain are mounting as at least 20 meatpacking plants have closed over the past two months and at least 20 workers have died of COVID-19.
Top-shelf meats such as filet mignon are selling at their lowest prices in a decade, plunging by nearly 40 percent as steakhouses close due to coronavirus lockdowns. A picture of LongHorn Steakhosue casual dining restaurant in Princeton, New Jersey above
At the same time the cost of simpler meats like ground beef and ribeyes have surged as customers flock to stores and stock up food as they bunker down in their homes to wait out quarantine orders. Racks of empty meat counter shelves at a Walmart in Emporia, Kansas pictured above
With restaurants seeing a slump in demand for prime cut stakes, meats like beef tenderloin are now selling at bargain prices
Near empty racks of meat due to an increase in demand and growing meat shortages, at Costco in Commack, New York
Best Market in Mineola, New York on Wednesday. Supply experts say the ‘last two weeks in May will be the peak of the meat crisis’ as some stores ration their produce
Furthermore, some 6,500 infected or exposed to the virus, according to the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union. The closures and outbreaks have slashed pork production by 25 percent and beef by 10 percent.
The Urner Barry Choice Boxed Beef Cutout, which represents the estimated gross value of a beef carcass, has seen the price of meat surge from March to April.
The price of beef was set at $206.18 ‘per hundredweight’ for the week ending in March 7.
That price jumped to $240.16 in the week ending on March 20. It rose further to $260.49 on April 23, Morrison said.
While everyday meats are seeing a surge in prices, fancier cuts can be purchased at bargain prices.
‘Tenderloin (filet mignon) prices are at 10-year lows as they are not typically purchased at retail. Others including outside skirts and briskets. Most people can’t or don’t have tools to cook these beef items, so discounts have become the norm,’ Morrison said.
Worries over the country’s meat supply chain are mounting as at least 20 meatpacking plants have closed over the past two months. A closed Tyson Fresh Meats plant pictured in Logansport, Indiana on April 23
An employee handles a side of pork at a Smithfield Foods Inc. pork processing facility in Milan, Missouri on April 12. Three of the country’s biggest pork processing plants have already closed due to COVID-19 outbreaks, accounting for 15 percent of pork production
Today there are concerns over the security of the meat industry as meat processing plants across the country have been shut down due to COVID-19 outbreaks among employees, which will lead prices to rise again.
‘Now, due to the pork plant closures, prices are rising again, but this time due to a lack of supply,’ Russ Barton, a pork market reporter at Urner Barry said to CBS.
Worries over dwindling meat supplies led President Donald Trump to sign an executive order on Tuesday invoking the Defense Production Act to keep meat packing plants open.
However, it’s not clear if infected workers will return or what new measures will be put in place to assure worker safety.
‘Slaughter has been impacted significantly as more plants close for positive [COVID-19] cases, to proactively protect workers, or because labor just won’t show up,’ Morrison said.
Now a major issue facing the meat supply chain is a growing amount of animals on farms and not enough butcher facilities to take them.
‘We do not currently have the capacity to process the amount of live hogs that are out there,’ Barton said.
‘This lack of capacity then results in a lack of pork cuts being manufactured and therefore supply declines and prices rise.’
So far pork has been hit the hardest in coronavirus meat supply chain disruptions, Stephens Inc Ben Bienvenu said.
A worker at Smithfields Food in Crete, Nebraska protests outside the factory demanding protective clothing. Many employees claim Trump’s order puts their lives at stake due to unsafe conditions and a lack of protective equipment
Crete, Nebraska: While some praised the president’s effort to preserve the meat supply chain, others slammed the president for trying to ramp up meat production instead of medical supplies
‘We estimate that roughly 20 percent to 25 percent of US processing capacity has been suspended or still remains suspended, and another 30 percent to 35 percent of total industry processing capacity lies at risk,’ he said Tuesday in a note to investors.
Tyson Foods has shuttered several of its meat packing facilities due to employee outbreaks.
Its Chairman John H. Tyson took out a full page newspaper ad on Sunday to warn the public that millions of chickens, pigs, and cattle will have to be euthanized because producers have nowhere to send them.
‘The food supply chain is breaking,’ he warned.
Tyson shut down its Waterloo, Iowa plant last week on April 22 after 180 workers got infected with the virus.
Three of the country’s biggest pork processing plants – Smithfield Foods in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, JBS pork processing in Worthington, Minnesota and Tyson Fresh Foods in Waterloo, Iowa have shut down. Together they account for 15 percent of pork production.
Rural America braces to become the next coronavirus epicenter because of outbreaks at factories and food processing plants
Rural America is bracing to become the next coronavirus epicenter after a number of outbreaks in factories and food processing plants.
Experts say the numbers show communities with factories and farm work have seen a spike in cases – and that’s down to ‘lots of people working in very close contact in these essential jobs’.
Angela Hewlett, associate professor in infectious disease at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, said: ‘The epicenter of this outbreak really has shifted into the smaller rural areas.’
Current data shows there are 1,939 cases in Minnehaha County – where Sioux Falls is located. The death toll stands at six. South Dakota has a total 2,313 cases and 11 deaths as a whole
In Salinas, California, many cases are connected to local lettuce farms. In Monterey County, where Salinas is located, data shows there are 191 confirmed cases there with five deaths
Greeley, Colorado, where there is a large JBS meatpacking plant, has seen a spike in cases
Areas that show a rise in cases include Sioux Falls in South Dakota where a shuttered Smithfield meat processing plant has been responsible for a large proportion of the cases in the state.
As of Wednesday data shows there are 1,939 cases in Minnehaha County – where Sioux Falls is located. The death toll stands at six.
South Dakota has a total 2,313 cases and 11 deaths as a whole.
In Salinas, California, many cases are connected to local lettuce farms, Vox reports. In Monterey County, where Salinas is located, data shows there are 191 confirmed cases with five deaths.
And Washington, DC has less cases per capita within its hospital region that Greeley, Colorado, where there is a large JBS meatpacking plant, the report adds.