Tag: GIPSA

NFU Pleased with Initial Read of Farm Bill Conference Report

Mike Callicrate

For Immediate Release Jan. 27, 2014 Contact: Melisa Augusto, 202-314-3191, maugusto@nfudc.org NFU Pleased with Initial Read of Farm Bill Conference Report WASHINGTON (Jan. 27, 2014) – National Farmers Union (NFU) President Roger Johnson issued the following statement following the 2014 Farm Bill Conference Committee’s release of its report on The Agricultural Act of 2014: “Upon initial review of the language released by the committee, NFU is pleased with the final bill. I know that the farm bill is Read More …

From Berkeley to Boston: Coming Together Around Freedom, Fairness and Food

Mike Callicrate

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 …

Obama’s Game of Chicken

Mike Callicrate

The untold story of how the administration tried to stand up to big agricultural companies on behalf of independent farmers, and lost. By Lina Khan | Print (PDF) In May 2010, Garry Staples left his chicken farm in Steele, Alabama, to take part in a historic hearing in Normal, an hour and a half away. The decision to go wasn’t easy. The big processing companies that farmers rely on for their livelihood had made it known that even Read More …

Is OCM Irrelevant?

Mike Callicrate

September 4, 2012 By Mike Callicrate With much appreciation for the courageous leadership of our past president, Fred Stokes, I write my first message as OCM’s president. I recently asked Fred, “Is OCM irrelevant? How can there be competitive markets without competitors?” In his important and must-read book, Cornered, author Barry C. Lynn describes how every major industry is controlled by a few companies – cartels, shared monopolies and outright monopolies. Always considered one of the greatest threats Read More …

Allies of competitive markets to gather in Kansas City

Mike Callicrate

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 …

USDA’s unused case to push its own rule

Mike Callicrate

By Alan Guebert In a striking, two-and-a-half page analysis that ran counter to department leanings, the chief economist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture strongly objected to the department’s use of two outside studies that justified the massive retooling—essentially gutting—of the 2010 update of Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) rules to ensure fairness in livestock and poultry markets. The memo was one needle in a nearly 1,700-page haystack USDA forked over in reply to Freedom of Read More …

Another Market Reformer Quits

Mike Callicrate

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 …

Ranchers Must Keep Pushing, Ex-GIPSA Chief Says

Mike Callicrate

Updated: Wednesday, February 08, 2012 11:42 AM By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Capital Press Ranchers risk losing their independence unless they keep pressing for stronger oversight of meat packers, according to a former USDA official who recently resigned after losing a battle over livestock industry reforms. Cattle producers are subject to the same forces as the packer-dominated hog and chicken industries, said Dudley Butler, who left his post as chief of the agency’s Grain Inspection Packers and Stockyards Administration in Read More …