“I will tell you right here today and will say it a thousand times all over the country we don’t want fewer farmers . . . we want more farmers – more farmers means more connections to the animals – it means that there are more custodians, more stewards, more people who know about farming”, Wayne Pacelle, President and Chief Executive Officer of The HSUS speaking at the 2013 Organization for Competitive Markets “Voices Rising From The Land” Read More …
By Mike Callicrate & Fred Stokes Eating is one thing we all have in common. And, to millions of us, what we eat, how it’s produced, and where it comes from is important. OCM has worked for the last fourteen years to restore competition in the agricultural marketplace. We believe family farmers and ranchers make the best stewards of our land and livestock, and are the most reliable and trustworthy sources of high quality, healthy and safe food. Read More …
For Immediate Release October 19, 2012 Mad Cow, E. coli and abusive market power broker the deal The world witnessed as Cargill and Tyson plundered the Canadian cattle and beef industries after the 2003 Mad Cow debacle. By 2008, there was little meat left on the industries’ bones, so Tyson sold to Nilsson Brothers Inc., an Alberta based cattle dealer, auction house operator, and owner of a 10,000 head per week Calgary meat plant, making Nilsson Canada’s largest Read More …
Chris Clayton, DTN Ag Policy Editor | Mon Oct 8, 2012 12:54 PM CDT OMAHA (DTN) — The Mississippi Farm Bureau\board of directors may vote to boot a director off its board because of his role in litigation involving the beef checkoff. Fred Stokes, a 77-year-old retired Army veteran who has run a small cattle operation in Mississippi, has spent much of his time over the past several years raising Cain against large market forces in agriculture such Read More …
Farm and Food File for the week beginning Sunday, Aug. 26, 2012 by Alan Guebert Somewhere along the line it became acceptable to bend and break the record of public figures and firms without any consequence whatsoever. Shortly thereafter distortion and deception replaced discussion and debate and yelling and lying replaced compromise and progress. And that’s just in agriculture; in politics it’s even worse. The latest farm and food fight centers on the legal battle that pits the Read More …
PRESS RELEASE Organization for Competitive Markets P.O. Box 6486 Lincoln, NE 68506 www.competitivemarkets.com Contact: Fred Stokes 662 476 5568, cell 601 527 2459 tfredstokes@hughes.net August 6, 2012 KANSAS CITY, MO. — This week’s annual convention of the Organization for Competitive Markets will start out with a bang, as a bold new strategy to combat misuse of commodity check-off programs is unveiled at a pre-convention press conference Thursday afternoon. “We will be making a very important announcement regarding how Read More …
Thomas F. “Fred” Stokes President On January 26th, J. Dudley Butler resigned his position as the livestock industry’s top cop. It was a sad day for independent livestock producers and poultry growers. There was lots of excitement and enthusiasm as the Obama Administration’s Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Department of Justice (DOJ) forged an historic joint effort to deal with the long-neglected concentration and market power abuse in agriculture. But after some three years and five workshops which Read More …
Thomas F “Fred” Stokes President After attending an OCM retreat near Kansas City in 2000, noted writer William Greider wrote an article containing this rather apocalyptic bit of prophecy. “The contemporary triumph of free-market capitalism has revealed to farmers, if not to other Americans, the bitter last act in this drama. Farmers can see themselves being reduced from their mythological status as independent producers to a subservient and vulnerable role as sharecroppers or franchisees. The control of food Read More …