Farm Bill raises controversy among cattle producers
by Andy Phipps, posted Dec. 11, 2007
The 2007 Farm Bill, which is currently pending in conference between the Senate and House of Representatives, has yet to be passed, but it has already had a controversial history.
While the five-year, $288 billion bill provides for many reforms, such as a revenue-based subsidy program, an expansion of the popular Wetlands Reserve Program and a $1.6 billion commitment to renewable energy research, it has also been threatened with a veto by the White House and continues to be debated in conference.
But the controversy isn’t in Washington alone. Cattle producers across the nation, including those in Missouri, are split over several provisions of the bill that could greatly change their industry.
In the Senate version of the bill, an amendment sponsored by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) calls for a ban on meatpacker ownership of cattle. This has been a chief concern to members of the Missouri Cattlemen’s Association.
“The packer ban is an issue because it just simply disrupts our free market concept of the way we merchandise cattle and livestock here in this country,” said Jeff Windett, executive vice president for the Missouri Cattlemen’s Association.
The cattlemen point to the amendment’s language as their reason for dissent. The section, as it currently reads, would ban value added producer marketing agreements, marketing alliances and forward marketing contracts between cattlemen and packers, supposedly limiting marketing options for producers.
Others have a different view of the ban.
“[The current system] just gives corporations more control over the livestock and over the market,” said Tim Gibbons, communications director for the Columbia-based Missouri Rural Crisis Center. “It’s not really a free market when a percentage of it is held by corporations with divertible integration of livestock in America.
“It is, in a large part, why independent livestock producers are on the decline,” Gibbons said. “And that’s not good. We see packers being able to own livestock before slaughter just furthers their control of the market. When corporations are fighting against corporations for the bottom line, it’s hard for independent producers to have any control or any say.”
The cattlemen’s association disagrees.
“They just completed and finished a year ago a study that was funded by the taxpayers to study whether packers were allowed to participate in the marketplace, what effects that would have on the price of cattle. And that study strongly showed that we would get less money for our cattle [if the ban were in effect],” Windett said.
If the ban were passed, the cattlemen’s association also fears that it would have immediate effects on the industry as a whole.
“If this were to go into effect, you would see lower prices for our cattle. How low that would be we don’t know,” said Ken Disselhorst, chairman of the National Cattlemen’s Association’s national policy board. “But at this time in our cattle cycle, we’re not ready to accept less money for our livestock.”
Others believe that the problem is the current system.
“It’s hard for [producers] to make money,” Gibbons said. “So, anything that can in any way stop the vertical integration of our livestock industry, in our opinion, will be good for independent producers.”
There is also an ongoing debate about the bill’s mandate for country of origin labeling. As the legislation is currently worded, it will become mandatory when the bill is passed.
“We think that consumers want to know where their meat is coming from,” Gibbons said. “It will show people where the thing that they’re consuming is coming from.”
While many are for the provision, the cattlemen believe that it should be a voluntary requirement.
“I think that all of us would prefer a voluntary rather than the mandatory program that they’re asking for,” Windett said. “Farmers are notoriously bad at being told to do anything and I think that there would be some resentment toward the program, even though as written we can live with it.”
But with strong consumer support for country of origin labeling, others disagree.
“We can see where our T-shirts come from,” Gibbons said. “Why can’t we see where the meat we consume comes from?”
The controversy is bound to continue, with both the cattlemen calling on its members to petition their elected officials for removal of the packer ban in the bill as well as the recently established U.S. Cattlemen’s Association pouring its resources into calling for the ban to remain in place.
With the year rapidly drawing to a close and Congress about to adjourn for its winter break, what was originally the 2007 Farm Bill could easily become the farm bill of 2008.
