Industrial agriculture has been defined, even by its proponents, as a system where the farm owner, the farm manager and the farm worker are different people. That's a dramatic change from the historic structure of agriculture, where the people who labor in farming also make the decisions and reap the profits of their work.

Corporate farming leads to closed markets where prices are fixed not by open, competitive bidding, but by negotiated contracts, and where producers who don't produce in large volumes are discriminated against in price or other terms of trade.

A healthy and stable community depends not on the number of livestock being produced, but on the number of livestock producers living and working there. The Center works to create genuine opportunity for family farms and ranches.

We educate the public about the consequences of industrialization and corporate farming through our monthly newsletter. The last 12 months of Corporate Farming Notes are presented below.

January 2012

Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning recently announced an allocation of $100,000 from the Supplemental Environmental Project Fund to a new coalition of farm and commodity groups. Nebraska Farm Bureau, Cattlemen, Pork Producers, and the Nebraska State Dairy Association formed the coalition to oppose efforts of the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS).

The $100,000 comes from fines, restitution for clean-up, and other legal settlements in natural resource and environmental protection cases. The allocation was made despite the fact that HSUS announced earlier this year they will work in partnership with Nebraska Farmers Union to seek market-oriented solutions to humane livestock treatment concerns, forestalling the possibility of a ballot initiative in the state.

“I’m proud to support efforts to protect the cornerstone of our state economy from the actions of extremist groups,” said Bruning. I wonder how the defenders of Initiative 300 – Nebraska’s constitutional provision prohibiting corporate farming in the state, overturned in federal court in 2005 – could have benefited from a similar allocation.

In November the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources announced final approval of a proposal by Richfield Dairy, a subsidiary of Milk Source Holdings, to build a 4,300-cow dairy in Adams County. The controversial project has considerable opposition locally over environmental concerns.

Richfield Dairy will increase Milk Source Holdings ownership to 26,500 cows and a 9,200 calf operation near De Pere. The new permit will impose conditions on the operation that will protect groundwater and local waterways from manure and heavy water use.

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals will rehear a lawsuit against four international marketers of potash, a fertilizer component. Plaintiffs accused potash producers in Canada, Russia, Belarus and the United States of operating a cartel to fix prices in Brazil, China and India.

A three-judge panel held that the anti-competitive conduct did not involve U.S. imports and did not directly affect the price of U.S. imports. The plaintiffs argued that inflated prices in overseas markets directly influence the domestic price of potash and appealed the initial decision, asking for a hearing before the full 7th Circuit, which was granted.

Contact John Crabtree for more information or to comment. Call 402.687.2103, ext. 1010 or email johnc@cfra.org.

 

 

December 2011

In recent weeks, issues surrounding the so-called GIPSA rule have become so complex that I think we need a timeline of sorts to keep everything straight.

• For as long as anyone can remember, and certainly for the last 40 years, meatpacking companies have offered sweetheart deals to the largest livestock producers, and deep, volume discounts for family farmers’ and ranchers’ hogs and cattle, in violation of the Packers and Stockyards (P&S) Act.
• For the last 15 years the Center for Rural Affairs has called on USDA and Congress to end the price discrimination that has driven so many independent family farm and ranch livestock producers out of business.
• In 2008, the Center for Rural Affairs and a handful of allied organizations helped secure the inclusion of language in the Farm Bill that required the Secretary of Agriculture to define an undue preference and make other reforms under the P&S Act.
• On June 22, 2010, USDA published a proposed rule defining an undue preference and reforming several other elements of the P&S Act. While not perfect, the rule was the most aggressive livestock market reform to come out of Washington since the passage of the P&S Act itself. USDA accepted comments until November 22, 2010, and then the rule languished for over a year.
• In November, USDA announced that some elements of the proposed rule would be finalized, but others, including language dealing with price discrimination (undue preferences) and other related livestock market reforms would not become final, meaning they likely will be withdrawn or simply never resubmitted or finalized.
• A week later the House and Senate Appropriation Conference Committee effectively gutted all the portions of the proposed livestock market reform rule that had not already been advanced by USDA by disallowing the use of any appropriated funds for advancing any additional portions of the proposed GIPSA rule.

At the Center for Rural Affairs, we don’t always win, but we fight the battles worth fighting, and we never give up. Recent events regarding the GIPSA rule were major setbacks for reforming livestock markets. However, we have the facts on our side, we have the law on our side and we have rural America on our side. Persistence and perseverance got us this far, and the same thing will lead us home again.

Contact me, John Crabtree, at johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103, ext. 1010 with comments and questions.

 

November 2011

Smithfield Foods, the nation’s largest producer and packer of hogs, has agreed to pay $44,079 to settle a federal lawsuit over dozens of Clean Water Act violations at the company’s John Morrell hog packing plant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Since May 2008, the South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources cited the Sioux Falls hog plant for 58 toxic discharge violations and reported Morrell as noncompliant with federal environmental statutes for nine quarters out of the last three years. Morrell processes 17,000 hogs per day at the facility and discharges 2.4 million gallons of wastewater per day into the Big Sioux River.

In addition, Morrell (Smithfield) will pay a federal civil penalty of $206,000 for ammonia discharges related to problems with the plant’s refrigeration system. In 2004 a pipe at the plant ruptured, venting 20,000 pounds of ammonia vapor and hospitalizing dozens of workers.

The settlement requires Morrell to conduct a comprehensive review of the plant’s wastewater treatment system and have any necessary improvements underway by October 2012. Surely $250,000 in fines is enough to make the Smithfield pork division, with $753.4 million in operating profit for 2011, stay on the straight and narrow.

On September 15, Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller announced the District Court approval of a consent decree submitted by the State of Iowa and AgFeed Industries, Inc. AgFeed is a Colorado-based hog production, packing and feed milling corporation with hog facilities and feed mills in multiple states, including Iowa.

AgFeed intends to increase its pork packing capacity by acquiring Pine Ridge, LLC while simultaneously expanding its hog contracting business. However, Iowa law prohibits a processor from directly or indirectly operating, financing, or controlling a swine operation within the state or contracting with Iowa producers for the care and feeding of swine.

In exchange for Iowa agreeing not to pursue enforcement of the state’s ban on packer involvement in swine production, AgFeed agrees to comply with a number of contract grower protections. The decree expires on September 16, 2015.

For more information, contact me, John Crabtree, at 402.687.2103, ext. 1010 or johnc@cfra.org.

 

October 2011

On Sept. 2, 2011, the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency denied the Water Quality Certification application submitted by California Dairy Magnate A. J. Boss. The permit was originally applied for in July 2008 with subsequent supplements submitted in 2009, 2010 and 2011.

The Army Corps of Engineers will not allow Bos to construct the manure pond without the certification, and the facility can’t receive an Illinois Department of Agriculture operating license without the proposed manure pond.

In the end, these developments appear to have finally shelved Bos’ plans for building a mega-dairy that would have eventually exceeded 11,000 cows near Nora, Illinois. We applaud the efforts of the Jo Daviess grassroots group HOMES (Helping Others Maintain Envi¬ronmental Standards) and their long-awaited and hard-fought victory.

Unfortunately, HOMES members report that disassembled barns from Bos’ Nora mega-dairy site are being trucked to the site of another mega-dairy under development in Rock County, Wisconsin.

Rock Prairie Dairy, a facility that would eventually house between four and five thousand cows, making it Wisconsin’s fourth largest dairy, originally requested up to $25 million in federal bonds through the Bradford Township Council. However, state law allows local residents to petition for a referendum, and a group of locals got organized and did just that.

But Todd Tuls of Nebraska, the principal investor in the project, decided he’d avoid a pesky vote of the local citizenry. Instead, he requested $15.6 million in Midwest Disaster Area bonds be issued from the Public Finance Authority, a governmental entity authorized to issue bonds to public and private projects without any provision for a referendum.

A bank would buy the bonds, issue a loan to Tuls, earn interest on the bonds, and thereby reduce the interest the project would be charged. Stay tuned for more about this deal.

Contact me, John Crabtree, with questions or comments. Call 410.687.2103 ext. 1010 or email johnc@cfra.org.

 

September 2011

In July, Bayer Crop Science agreed to pay up to $750 million to farmers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri and Texas to settle lawsuits over the 2006 contamination of the U.S. rice supply by genetically modified rice.

According to plaintiff’s attorney Don Downing, the contamination was devastating to a lot of rice farmers. “In this settlement, Bayer, for the first time, has offered to make it right for these farmers,” Downing continued.

The suit and subsequent settlement sends a signal that those who develop genetically modified seeds “need to keep those seeds very carefully contained until they’re approved for human consumption,” Downing added.

Approximately 11,000 farmers in the states of Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri and Texas filed lawsuits against the German company, claiming that their crops of long-grain rice had been tainted by the release of rice genetically modified to incorporate the herbicide resistance trait LibertyLink, which contaminated the rice supply in 2006.

Barry Estabrook, a freelance food writer published in The Atlantic, New York Times and Washington Post, has written a book called Tomatoland, which examines the industrialization of tomato production in the United States. The book joins a growing list of books that critically examines industrial agriculture in America. Estabrook’s offering is a worthwhile read.

The most critical element of Estabrook’s premise is that mass-produced tomatoes in American supermarkets lack flavor because they were raised to endure traveling hundreds or thousands of miles to the supermarket shelf and not for taste.

According to Estabrook, one large Florida tomato farmer told him, “I don’t get paid a single cent for flavor, I get paid for weight. It’s not worth commercial plant breeders’ while to breed for taste because their customers, namely large farmers, don’t get paid for it.” Such attitudes are not unique to industrial tomato farming. More’s the pity.

JBS, the world’s largest cattle feeder and beef packer, agreed to a settlement with the Brazilian government that eliminates a civil action and the potential for any fines for the packer’s illegal procurement of cattle from illegally deforested areas. So much for JBS’s self-promoted sustainability program.

For more information or to comment, contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 ext. 1010.

 

July 2011

On June 22, 2010, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack published a draft livestock market reform rule, commonly known as the GIPSA rule. He was following language in the 2008 Farm Bill.

Secretary Vilsack wrote a strong set of livestock market reforms, perhaps the boldest since the Packers and Stockyards Act first passed in 1921, legislation that was also a product of good, old-fashioned rural organizing in 1920-1921.

He did so because you urged him to do so. Congress put that language in the last farm bill because of the countless times family farmers, ranchers, and other concerned citizens, both rural and urban, called upon them to level the playing field and make livestock markets accessible and fair to all livestock producers, regardless of size.

I first heard about this issue on my birthday back in 1997 in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, when I listened to Center for Rural Affairs board member Keith Mahaney call for this rulemaking in his testimony to the National Commission on Small Farms. Since then I’ve heard thousands of family farmers and ranchers make the same call.

Eleven years later, together, all of us were able to finally get that provision in the farm bill. Two years after that, USDA’s livestock market reforms were issued. Another year later and we’re still waiting, still urging Secretary Vilsack and President Obama to move the rule forward, still urging Congress not to hamstring them.

Ninety years after the P&S Act was written, one year after the GIPSA rule was written, and grassroots action and advocacy continue to be the most important aspect of getting this job done.

Contact John Crabtree if you want to advocate for livestock market reforms, 402.687.2103 ext. 1010 or johnc@cfra.org.

 

June 2011

One year ago, on June 22, 2010, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack unveiled USDA’s new rule, under the Packers and Stockyards Act, which will reform livestock markets and restore some competition among meatpackers and poultry processors. It has been an interesting year.

Over 60,000 comments were received by November 22, after the deadline was extended to five months. USDA is currently reviewing the comments and performing a variety of economic and other analyses.

Of course, opponents of reform have not sat idly by these many months. The nearly constant whining of the American Meat Institute – the trade association that represents meatpacking interests – coupled with the squawking and squealing coming from the National Chicken Council and National Pork Producers Council while they shill for the packers has been almost deafening at times. And they’ve never bothered to worry about accuracy or analysis in their attacks, resorting instead to hyperbole and alarmist rhetoric.

They’ve gained some allies in Congress, however. But the choice is simple. Stand with family farmers and ranchers or stand with meatpackers and their industrial, corporate livestock allies. Now is a good time to call your representatives and senators, express your support for USDA’s livestock market reform rule, and urge them to publicly communicate their support to Secretary Vilsack.

While you’re at it, call USDA and encourage them to hold the line and move the rule forward. It’s time to draw a line in the sand and count out who is standing with family farmers, ranchers and rural communities, and who is not.

The Department of Justice filed a civil antitrust lawsuit in May challenging the acquisition of Tyson Foods’ Harrisonburg, Virginia, chicken processing complex. Justice department officials said the acquisition “eliminates substantial competition between the two companies for the procurement of chickens in the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, area.

“Our lawsuit alleges that George’s acquisition of Tyson’s Harrisonburg processing facility would reduce growers’ ability to receive competitive prices for their services,” said Christine Varney, Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust. “America’s farmers deserve competitive prices and terms for the sale of their services.”

For more information or to comment, contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 ext. 1010.

 

May 2011

On March 31, 2011, the Illinois Supreme Court denied a request by Helping Others Maintain Environmental Standards (HOMES) to review an appellate court decision rendered in December 2010, which denied HOMES’ petition to stop construction of California dairy Magnate A.J. Bos’ mega-dairy near Nora, Illinois.

Bos’ intention to continue with construction of the mega-dairy was recently reiterated by his legal counsel. However, HOMES spokesperson Matthew Alschuler pointed out that Bos has yet to obtain permission from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and the US EPA to proceed with construction.

Both the Florida and Iowa state legislatures are debating bills that would forbid animal rights activists from surreptitiously photographing or filming conditions at large, industrial livestock facilities. In Iowa, the legislation would make such photography or videography a felony. Kansas and Montana already have laws that ban taking secret photos of livestock facilities if the intent is to damage the owner.

Linus Solberg, a longtime Center for Rural Affairs friend who has raised hogs, cattle and sheep on his family farm near Cylinder, Iowa, for 57 years points out that thousands of pictures have been taken on their farm. “Visitors from all over the world have filmed artificial breeding; the births of lambs, pigs and calves; and the euthanasia of young animals if they were starving or suffering, because that’s part of animal husbandry,” said Solberg.

In a guest opinion submitted to the Des Moines Register Solberg wrote, “Nobody is sabotaging the livestock industry. The corporate clan is distorting the facts and instead of trying to correct the problems, is trying to kill the messenger … . Maybe the corporate clan should spend all that time and energy cleaning up their act, educating their workforce and firing people who abuse animals.”

I’ve learned to avoid disagreeing with Linus, especially when he’s right.

Contact John Crabtree for more information, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 x 1010.

 

April 2011

At Governor Terry Branstad’s request, legislation was introduced in the Iowa House of Representatives to transfer water quality and federally mandated non-point source pollution programs from the Dept. of Natural Resources to the Dept. of Agriculture and Land Stewardship.

“I’ve seen no study or assessment that shows this will create efficiencies, save money or provide better protections for the quality of water in our state,” said Marian Riggs Gelb, Iowa Environmental Council’s Executive Director. “Why does Governor Branstad want this?”

In May 2010 Monroe Branstad, the Governor’s brother, was ordered by District Court Judge Colleen Weiland to pay $17,000 in fines for the August 2008 discharge of corn-silage leachate from a containment basin on Branstad’s rural Forest City cattle feeding operation into the Winnebago River.

Putting the Agriculture Department in charge of water quality laws is bad public policy. If the maneuver is about political cronyism, then the stench will be far worse, figuratively and literally.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in March that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) cannot require industrial livestock operations to obtain Clean Water Act (CWA) permits unless they are actively discharging manure into a waterway of the US.

The National Pork Producers Council, National Chicken Council, and other industrial livestock interest groups sued EPA over the “CAFO rule,” which set a zero-discharge standard and imposed fines of up to $37,500 per day for failure of a CAFO with a discharge to have applied for a CWA permit.

Derry Brownfield, 79, died in his rural Missouri home in March. Derry formed the Brownfield Network in 1972, and in 1994 he established his own radio show, the Derry Brownfield Show, and became widely known among farm broadcasters in the Midwest. Learfield Communications purchased the Brownfield Network in 1997, and in 2008 a dispute with major Learfield advertiser Monsanto resulted in cancellation of Derry’s show.

Brownfield continued broadcasting his show via webcast. And I, for one, intend to keep standing up for independent family farmers and ranchers to ensure that Monsanto doesn’t get the last word in their debate with Derry Brownfield.

Contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org with questions or comments.

 

March 2011

The Andrew County (Missouri) Health Department passed an ordinance limiting where industrial livestock operations can locate. The proposed construction of a 10,000-head hog operation 1.5 miles from Savannah High School prompted the ordinance, which prohibits farms with more than 300 animals from locating within 5 miles of a community with a population of more than 100 people.

Voters in western Kansas’ Greeley County overturned a 1998 referendum prohibiting industrial hog operations from locating in the county. Tom Farmer, mayor of Tribune, Kansas, told the Kansas City Star the recession is making it tough on small communities that have already felt hard times, hence, the change of heart about hog operations. “Greeley County desperately needs Seaboard,” Farmer said. We agree desperation is always a factor when industrial livestock integrators look to relocate.

Seaboard, which finishes and slaughters about 4 million hogs annually, proposed building an industrial operation with 120,000 hogs in Greeley County, creating 18 jobs. Concerns about water usage, nutrient runoff, odor and local infrastructure arose at meetings prior to the referendum, which ultimately passed by a vote of 190 to 171.

A federal judge in Vermont is reviewing a proposed antitrust suit settlement between Dean Foods and Northeastern dairy farmers. In the proposed settlement, Dean Foods said it would procure between 10 percent and 20 percent of raw milk destined for plants in Lynn and Franklin, Massachusetts, and East Greenbush, New York, from sources other than the Dairy Farmers of America (DFA) for 30 months. Dean Foods will also create a $30 million fund to settle antitrust claims. The suit was brought as a class action, meaning that between 5,000 and 10,000 farm families could receive a share of the settlement.

Contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 x 1010 for more information.

 

January 2011

The Justice Department and the US Department of Agriculture hosted the final joint workshop on antitrust and competition in agriculture and the food system in Washington, DC on Dec. 8, 2010. The workshop focused on producer-to-retail price margins.

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack noted that in 2009, a hog producer received about 25 percent of the value of a hog sold at retail while in 1980 the farmer’s share would have been twice that. Concern that retail grocery consolidation will continue to shrink the farm and ranch share of the consumer dollar predominated among workshop panelists and participants alike.

Attending three of the five workshops this year convinced me, begrudgingly, that Justice and USDA are sincerely searching to find new ways to address consolidation at the production, processing and retail levels of the food system. However, challenging vertical integration in livestock production and retail grocery consolidation (e.g. Walmart) is a long row to hoe.

I cannot imagine how much the packers would squeal if, for example, Justice and USDA proposed to limit or prohibit packer ownership of livestock – as we’ve long advocated. Nonetheless, I applaud Attorney General Holder and Secretary Vilsack for conducting these workshops and seeking justice for America’s family farmers, ranchers and rural communities.

Contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 x 1010 for more information.

 

December 2010

Last month I reported on a spill from the mega-dairy that is under development by A.J. Bos near Nora, Illinois. One of Bos’ retention ponds sprung a leak, and the nearby Apple River tributary ran as purple as purple could be (see the article and photographs here). Over the last month I’ve received a few calls from readers concerned that I don’t understand that anaerobic manure lagoons can and do turn purple.

Well, I do understand that. Under certain conditions anaerobic lagoons will become pink or purple as a result of the growth of purple sulfur bacteria (e.g. Chromatium, Thiocapsa or Thiopedia) that under anaerobic conditions use hydrogen sulfide and ammonia for cell growth. I’ve seen purple lagoons. I’ve never seen anything like the color of the creek that ran purple near the Bos mega-dairy.

Moreover, the purple discharge was from a retention pond, not a lagoon. While a purple color may indicate a “healthy” anaerobic lagoon, it certainly connotes the opposite for a river.

The official comment period for USDA’s livestock market reform rule (often referred to as the GIPSA rule) closed on November 22. You can read the Center for Rural Affairs official comments here. We urge Secretary Vilsack to strengthen the rule and move toward final implementation as soon as practicable. America’s family farmers and ranchers have waited long enough for this crucial reform.

On November 5, the FDA announced that Ohio Fresh Egg “had a routine environmental study sample which tested positive for Salmonella Enteritidis.” Consequently, Cal-Maine Eggs, one of the nation’s largest egg producers, recalled over 300,000 eggs purchased from Ohio Fresh and distributed in eight states. Seems even with his Wright County, Iowa, egg facilities shut down, Jack DeCoster can still find a way to have eggs recalled.

For more information, contact John Crabtree, johnc@cfra.org or 402.687.2103 x 1010.