Homeland Security

Homeland Security

Introduction

Terrorism is generally a small word in our society and for most carry out image of suicide bombings in the Middle East, a damaged federal building in Oklahoma, a burning Pentagon in Washington DC, and planes booming into towers in New York City. As these kinds of acts are somehow exceptional, they have turn into the expression of modern times.

Bombs, planes, trucks, and even persons have been converted into common weapons of terrorism. But how about something as simple as food: can it be used as a weapon by terrorists and how do we stop such physical attack? In this paper we will talk about the current examples of food terrorism and preventive actions that would help to prevent or decrease the probability of a terrorist attack on our food supply.

Discussion

Throughout history, food supplies of civilians have frequently been threatened for sabotage through military operations to frighten or otherwise threaten civilian people. The threat of terrorist or biochemical attack raises special concern for both humans and animals alike. Deliberate acts of food sabotage by a variety of methods have been documented throughout history. For example, the common use of food and wine for the purpose of assassination brought about the need for rulers to enlist the services of tasters as well as spies for the kitchen. The principal rule at an imperial banquet was to eat only from a dish which had carefully been tasted beforehand.

Times have certainly changed since then and the U.S currently take pleasure from one of the protected food supplies in the world, but it is still weak to protect a terrorist attack. The reason is that infected food supply does not require any expertise and chance for right to access food supply. To believe that the food industry records 20% of the GNP and utilized 14 million people directly and additionally $ million in associated businesses, it is simple to recognize the weakness of the food supply. Access to the food supply could occur at any number of access points including harvesting, packing, shipping, delivery, or preparation. This means that food is susceptible for deliberate contamination anywhere from the farm all the way to your fork.

There are some possible elements for food contamination that have different characteristics. Such elements comprise biological, chemical, radiological, and physical elements. Biological elements contain but are not restricted to bacteria, poison, viruses, and parasites. Biological elements can ...