Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/09/14/usda-approves-shipping-slaught.html
…
2 Likes
Have a drumstick and your brain stops tickin’
15 Likes
This is actually a place where a tariff on an import/export might actually be useful for fighting market stupidity.
18 Likes
As long as it is still finger-lickin’ good…
2 Likes
Yeah, I’m down with chicken crossing the ocean in a shipping container for 6 weeks each way. Yeah, no problem at all. /s
Perhaps the cost saving is reusing the containers.
5 Likes
I don’t think this will end well for consumers. The worst part, IMHO, is that there is no labeling of the chicken being processed in China so that it could be avoided.
10 Likes
I’m glad i don’t eat meat a lot, and i’m typically picky about eating chicken from fast food places (ie: i usually avoid it). This seals the deal, i’m definitely staying away from cheap chicken.
10 Likes
I bought a stick that was made in China. If America can’t even make a stick economically than how great are we. For that matter, why couldn’t I just cut a branch in the woods and use that.
15 Likes
It’s not like China has a history of adulterating food…
<cough>cadmium<cough>
<mumble>lead<mumble>
<cough>melamine<cough>
18 Likes
This will not be good.
6 Likes
“Economically, it doesn’t make much sense,” said Tom Super,
…as he punched a hole in a nearby container ship and rescued over 10,000 shivering chickens.
6 Likes
After Chinese-made dog treats almost killed my dog (and many others), I am extremely distrusting of any edible items from China.
17 Likes
And no labeling requirements! I wonder why that was important to folk?
17 Likes
The winner of the “Shipping Idiotic Things” award still goes to Fiji water.
7 Likes
Is aged chicken a thing, like dry aged beef?
1 Like
If I were an American chicken processor, I would label everything I shipped “Raised and Processed in the USA.” Of course then the Chinese will label their chicken “Raised in the USA,” clouding the issue.
I hate this stuff. I hate that Trump co-opted “Make American Great Again,” because now it almost feels bad to try and buy American, as if I’m some kind of jingoist asshole. I’m raising kids here, in this country, and they will need to have a fully formed economy. Not like what the Baby Boomers left us Gen Xers and the poor Millennials. It will not be enough for us to just make apps and sell them back and forth to each other. We have to make and process actual goods. In China, there are things that cost less than 1 cent. Think of that. They can manufacture, transport, and retail a good for less than 1 cent and that’s good business for them. How on earth can we compete with that without some form of protectionism?
If I had a nickel for every product that has a little American flag in the corner with some sort of misleading statement like, “Designed in the USA,” that nickel would probably be made in China too.
11 Likes
A 40’ shipping container can hold about 20,000 kg of chicken carcasses, and more than that when shipped back as chicken parts (greater density).
Let’s assume a person working slowly can process about 50 kg per hour. It’s higher than this but let’s go on the low end.
One container of chicken carcasses would cost approximately $12/hr x (20,000/50) = $4800 to process in the USA.
To ship this same container to China for processing would cost about $4000 in shipping fees (there and back), plus labor of $2/hr x (20,000/50) = $800 for a total of $4800.
The savings in those direct costs is probably negligible, but if you factor in real estate cost, accessorial costs like machinery and maintenance, cost of running a factory in China, etc, the savings are there.
4 Likes
It would make more sense to have a (Chinese owned) chicken processing plant floating off the coast of the United States, never making it to shore. Then have poultry workers (eg “fishermen”) working on this processing barge, and then repack the chickens for the short journey back to the United States. This is similar to have lumber is processed for the US and Canada.
5 Likes
That’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
…though there are bugs, too.
6 Likes
This is undoubtedly so we don’t have an influx of illegal aliens coming in to process our meat products. They can just stay outside our borders. MAGA! /s
7 Likes
