For those pursuing a career in emergency management, one of the most salient concerns facing this and other nations is agroterrorism. While it lacks the bombastic fanfare of different types of aggressive action against one or more countries, it is perhaps a more devastating manner of attacking a perceived enemy, and many kinds of groups or individuals can employ it. Being aware of the potential impacts and designing plans to help mitigate or prevent such attacks is vital to the continued security and prosperity of any modern nation. The article below discusses what it is, who may wield this type of terrorist threat, and some potential impacts of such an attack.
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Historical Roots
Often, the simplest weapons or strategies endure when more advanced technologies quickly lose their potency. Agroterrorism is a form of bioterrorism, and it is far from new. Whether you consider Assyrians poisoning wells or Romans plowing the fertile fields of Carthage with salt, this approach to hamstringing an entire culture has maintained salience for thousands of years.
Primarily, this type of attack focuses on a society’s ability to sustain the lives of the people who claim affiliation with it. It has been used consistently to devastate perceived enemies across a spectrum, from local to transnational. Because its tactics are simple and food security an often overlooked aspect of defense, almost anyone can perpetrate an attack that is certain to have far-reaching and long-drawn consequences.
In the Here and Now
In terms of the modern American nation-state, agroterrorism is one of the most potentially impactful weapons any group or individual can utilize precisely because it isn’t a flashy or attention-getting area of our economy. However, by releasing a pathogen into our food supply—either animal or plant-based—it can have the effect of crippling the national economy.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) defines this act as a deliberate introduction of plant or animal disease vectors for the specific purpose of inducing terror, causing economic losses, and undermining social stability. They also note that secondary goals may include damaging the confidence of the People in the powers of government to oversee the tranquility and prosperity of the nation.
While the FBI does note that groups of all sizes and makeups can use tactics associated with this type of terrorism, it’s primary concern remains transnational ideologically-driven groups such as ISIS and Al Qaeda. Analysts have long known that leaders of the group would target this comparatively unguarded area of the American economy because even a minor upset in the food supply can have dramatic economic consequences for a large number of citizens. The food supply represents a $trillion industry network, each aspect of which is intimately linked with others. Disrupt one, and it is only a matter of time before all areas of this economic lynchpin show signs of stress.
Other Types of Perpetrators
While most national and international terrorist watchdog groups continue to focus on the aforementioned transnational ideologues, there are others who perceive an opportunity in such acts of terrorism. Economic opportunists rank a close second on this list. They might introduce a pathogen in order to sway the market in their favor. Below them, domestic separatist groups may use these weapons as a way to undermine what they perceive to be a bloated and unjust central government. And most locally, small groups or individuals may introduce disease vectors to shape small-scale political or social events to their liking.
Much like all forms of bioterrorism, these types of attack strike what may seem like unforeseeable moments. They are relatively easy to engineer, and the information needed to render them devastating in terms of economic and domestic stability is publicly available. That being said, most types of agroterrorism are preventable or manageable with awareness, redesigning how the interdependent systems of a food economy relate, and contingency action plans crafted to curtail disease vectors before they spread.