palmer, apologiys to matt damon, i'm going stand in front of the refrigerator, goodnight. this is "nightline." tonight, pandemic pressure. farmers on the front lines of america's food supply, fighting for survival. sf >> this is where pork comes from. >> covid-19 outbreaks contaminating processing plants, now get beiting back to busines. plus, the rise of impossible foods. why plant-based protein is all the rage during the pandemic. now the rare inside tour of how the sausage is made. >> you could scoop your hand in and take a bunch of it and eat it. >> but, will the future of food be green? >> "nightline" starts right now, with byron pitts. >> good evening, thank you for

joining us. tonight the pause before the big holiday break this weekend. more than 40% of the country either stopping or reversing their plans to reopen. the meat industry also trying to bounce back with farmers some of the hardest hit, now bracing for a possible second wave of covid-19. here's my "nightline" co-anchor, juju chang. >> reporter: raising pigs is a family tradition for randy jay wurtsma. >> hog farming is built on flow of lots of numbers, tight margins. >> reporter: for three generations, this 2500-acre farm in rushmore, minnesota has kept food on the table for his own family and thousands of others across the country. >> of course we're in business to make a profit, make money and make a living, but we an essential cog in feeding the world. many farms like mine. this is where pork comes from. without us, there wouldn't be

any. >> reporter: wurtsma is contracted to sell his pigs, 24,000 a year, to one of the biggest pork processing companies, until it was interrupted two months ago. >> more meat packing plants close. >> several major meat processing plants are struggling to keep up due to sick workers. >> reporter: today he's still recovering from the bloe blw of first wave of covid-19, shutting down major meat processors, including jbs this spring, yet, he's finding himself bracing again. >> i am very concerned about a second wave of coronavirus. we're still backed up on pigs from the first shutdown. >> reporter: with at least 38 states report ago increase in covid cases, wurtsma is among the many worried about the economy coming to another stand still and creating a lasting impact on the meat supply chain.

>> will we ever run out of meat? the answer's no. will we run into shortages? yeah, it therethere's a good possibility. >> reporter: the shutdown left him with a farm full of pigs ready for slaughter. you could lose the farm literally. how heavy does that weigh on you. >> when that plant closed down, when we had no market for our pigs, technically, we had 15,000 pigs in our yard, and they were worth zero. this will be absolutely devastating to many farms. >> reporter: the decisions to preef prevent overcrowding, euthanizing pigs and put being some on a slower diet to slow their growth. >> this is the feed system. our target is normally to make them grow three pounds a day, now we're trying to get them to grow one pound a day or liiess.

>> reporter: he lost $200,000 in revenue two weeks. if he does have to kill his large hogs it would be a greater hit. >> eliminating it not to food is, it's just emotionally and physically and mentally, i mean, it's absolutely awful. >> reporter: it hurts you not just in the pocket book. it's got to hurt you in the gut somewhere. >> i mean, these pigs are one of god's gifts. these pigs are intended for food. it's literally sinful to take this food and destroy it. >> reporter: how does culling your herd, culling down those pigs affect the food chain down the line? >> there will come a point down the road when the packers are trying to kill pigs and there won't be enough pigs there. i firmly believe. some farms are going to go out of business, it's inevitable. >> reporter: when meat packing plants did reopen many couldn't return to pre-pandemic capacity in part because of concerns of

the virus spreading. >> these large-scale packers know and are not hesitant to admit that the employee is the most important piece to the puzzle. keeping them safe, taking into account their mental health is very important. >> reporter: over 26,000 covid-19 cases have been tied to meat packing plants. with these large-scale meat packing plants, we have hundreds and maybe thousands, up to maybe two or three thousand employees that come together to work. when you have large groups of people that come together, it me a hot spot.se that i w one of the country's biggest clusters of covid this spring was at smith field foods processing plant in sioux falls, southe worker said it wasn't wo the $17 an hour she was making. >> i was thinking it was not a

safe place to work, especially to protect my family. >> reporter: what made you think it wasn't safe? >> there is no social distance. we are working all together. we are working in lines. >> reporter: one feet apart? two feet apart? >> no, i can say a few inches. >> reporter: she quit in april after working at smith field for ten years. >> they told us in the first meeting that we are essential workers and we need to keep working to provide all the food to the tables. but at the same point, we are humans. we need to healthfully keep working. >> reporter: as early as february i was told, they began instituting a number of covid-19 processes and protocols to protect our employees' health and safety, to implement protective measures across our more than 40 u.s. facilities. the company said there are inescapable realities about our

industry, posing challenges to social distancing, including installing plexiglass and adding mass thermal scanning systems. some major processing plants, including smithfields are now beginning to approach full capacity once again. meanwhile, the meat supply line has been getting help from the little guy. or gal, in the case of johnson sausage shop in rio, wisconsin. chris johnson owns this meat market and small processing facility. she typically slaughters 25-50 animals a week. just a fraction of the bigger plants' kill capacity. but over the last few months she's been taking on as many animals as they can handle, helping farmers get rid of the backlog. >> we are their only hope, untik hav tow them a when tir drm

ou have no food. >> reporter: she says farmers have been posting about their surplus on social media. her customers then step in to purchase an animal right off the farm and bring it to chris. >> people have never bought a half a hog or quarter beef. they've never done this before and realized this is the way they should have been buying meat all along. >> reporter: because she se's smaller in size, she has fewer workers, a key factor in preventing covid-19 outbreaks. she's completely booked through early next year, now processing 70 to 80 animals a week, almost doubling her pre-pandemic output. every additional she takes on benefits farmers aonsumers. >> ift have the small plants, the food would be difficult. >> these guys are by far the

bargain, the way to go. >> reporter: and all the extra work at chris's plants means jobs for people in her community. >> it's a win-win for everybody. they need money, i need workers. it's financial chain. somebody is unemployed, just need a little bit of time until they get called back, i will definitely take them on. >> if there's something to take home with this covid-19 is that our local meat processors still have a place at the table and will continue to have a place at the table. however, this is a band-aid. they can't fix the problem. that's the bottom line. >> reporter: although the meat processing is beginning to pick up again, the glut of product and the recession mean farmers like wurtsma are getting paid less for their animals. >> nobody is moving around like they normally do. the cruise ships. hotel lines and ball games. nobody's going out to have a hot dog at a ball game. >> reporter: he's just hoping he can hang on through this period so he can pass the farm on to a

fourth generation, his son. >> we're always hopeful about the future of farming. farming has always had its challenges throughout the years. as long as there's an outlet for our products, we generally figure out a way to make it go. >> our thanks to juju. up next, a look at the unlikely booming business right now. what made the impossible burger possible. drop the taco. get in the car. does this sentra feel like a compromise to you? wait, what...? the handling is good, right? no compromise there. nope! watch this... umm... b-brie...brie brie! rear automatic braking. so if this nissan sentra isn't gonna compromise, why should you? you're right! atta girl. the all-new nissan sentra. with more standard safety features than any other car in its class.

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as the summer heats up, so does a popular american staple, the burger. people ready for 4th of july festivities this weekend, they may be reaching for a plant-base the alternative. here's matt gutman with why this vegetarian version is giving the classic a run for its money. >> reporter: it may look like raw beef. >> literally at this point you could scoop your hand in, take a bunch of it and eat it. >> reporter: but the stainless

steel machinery is churning out a popular meat alternative, which you don't even have to cook to eat. >> i guess it's a significant difference when you're dealing with a product like soybeans rather than live animals. >> reporter: our team was granted exclusive yak ses ines o impossible foods. plant-based alternative companies like impossible foods and beyond meat are seeing a huge surge in demand right now. in part, prompted by nationwide shortages in meat, caused by covid outbreaks in meat plants. slaughterhouses often employ thousands of workers, elbow to elbow. soybeans? that's a lot less messy and certainly a lot safer for workers. impossible ceo pat brown says employee safety has been one of the company's top priorities. how hasecd

production? >> production has been kept pretty well. as you saw, we were able to create a very safe environment. obviously, with this big space and the handful of people, social distancing is not a challenge. >> reporter: this spring, meat packing plants suffered some of their biggest disruptions in decades due to covid outbreaks, and stores afraid of meat shortages put limits on the number of packages consumers could buy. but sales of meat alternatives were up, nearly 250% in just the 12 weeks ending on may 23rd. >> we're expanding our production. we're selling everything we can produce. >> reporter: brown's vision for t the future of this industry is ambitious. your goal is to kill the meat industry? >> i would say yes. it falls on our shoulders to create foods that do a better job of serving meat-loving consumers than the ones that are made from animals. >> reporter: you know, when we think of things that are

destructive to the environment and planet, we think fossil fuels. >> yeah. >> reporter: airplanes, cars, motorcycles, anything like that. we don't think meat. >> i think more and more people are now becoming aware of this. i would say pretty much all serious environmentalists realize the number one environmental threat is the use of animals to produce food. >> reporter: just a few years ago, even the idea that a plant-based alternative could disrupt the meat industry seemed impossible. today brown insists it's not only possible, it's probable. the key, he says, is taste. and while turning legumes into meat involves some modern-day alchemy, the end result? well, it tastes exactly like a burger, like any other burger. plant-based meats even r the final frontier of american

fast food like burger king. even dunkin' donutskin' donutskt dogg lending their star power. but some critics warn that both impossible and beyond burgers are heavily processed. >> in general, what we understand about the human diet and about the way that humans are evolved, ultra processed food tends to be much less good for you than the whole foods alternatives. >> reporter: but it may not matter to americans who are increasingly consuming meat alternatives, not because they're vegetarians, but because of the environmental impact of meat consumption. >> if you replace a pound of cow-derived beef with a pound of impossible beef, you reduce your greenhouse gas footprint by the equivalent of the daily average

commute in the u.s. >> we're all becoming much more aware as a society. but our lifestyle is unsustainable. many of the movements of young people who are interested in this are saying, yes, we need to address sustainability but we need to address labor rights, immigration. and the problems involved in the food system are very, very big. >> reporter: but plant-based alternatives are on average more expensive than regular ground beef. they average $8.99, $11.99 a pound, searas much as a rib eye. and with unemployment for many americans, the added cost could be a deal breaker. is there a way to reduce the price? >> yes, absolutely a way to reduce the price. the one thing they have that we don't have is they're a mature industry. when we get to scale, our economics are structurally better than the incumbent industry, and we'll be able to compete on price. >> reporter: but, when brown

surveys the future of his company, he see it is interconnected with the future of the planet. >> our mission is to completely replace animals as a food technology by 2035. the rate of climate change and possibly worse, the collapse of biodiversity, which is almost entirely due to the use of animals in the food system, if we don't stop and reverse those things very soon we're going to be passing on a dismal world to future generations. >> reporter: pofor "nightline," matt gutman in oakland, california. >> our thanks to matt. and next, the best kind of pick-me-up. >> thank you, greg, thank you!

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and their covid relief efforts all over the city. when we closed our wynn committed instantly to keeping all 15,000 team members on-board. we then focused our five-star level of service to all who needed it.

we made improvements to people's lives. we strove to be better and we made people happy. this closure may have temporarily taken us out of wynn and encore, but it couldn't take the wynn and encore out of us. and now, we are proud to welcome you back.

and finally tonight, delivering thanks. ups drive gregory watkins knows his route by heart. on the job in smithtown, new york, for 13 year. and since the pandemic started, the father of four going the extra mile and working longer hours. it did not go unnoticed.

>> whoo! thank you, greg, thank you! >> his customers secretly coordinating a surprise. >> i looked, and i was just like, oh, my goodness, is this for me? >> a special delivery for the delivery man. >> and my smithtown family, i love you guys. >> it was american writer richard bach who said the bond that links your true family is not one of blood but of respect and joy in others' life. that's might line for this evening. you can see us right back here tomorrow night, same time. thanks for the company, america, goodnight. >> jimmy: hell loerks io, i'm j. this is the eighth night of angry protests around this country and around the world, including here in los angeles where people are fed up with the inequities and abuse. our president, if we can still

even call him that seems to believe he is the warden over a prison break. he tweeted overwhelming force, domination, likewise, thank president. (thank you president trump!)." he wrote this. forget presidents, has any other person ever thanked himself in a tweet? other than trump, i don't think anyone has. like, could you imagine joe montana writing "san francisco. four super bowl rings. thank you joe montana!" no. you can't. because it's unimaginable. he is unimaginable. and while the president is giving himself another reacharound, we had another curfew tonight here in los angeles. there's a curfew in new york. looters, who should never be confused with protestors because they are different groups, have unfortunately provided the fox newsers with an excuse to lump people together. which is what they do best. i don't know about you, but i