Under Siege: The U.S. Live Cattle Industry
ACADEMIC JOURNAL ARTICLE
By Bullard, Bill
South Dakota Law Review, Vol. 58, No. 3
EXCERPT: Although the largest U.S. agricultural sector—the live cattle industry—is still comprised of hundreds of thousands of independent producers, it is currently on a trajectory to become a vertically integrated supply chain controlled by just a handful of dominant meatpackers. This is the fate already suffered by the nation’s hog and poultry industries within which once competitive markets have been replaced with corporate command and control and opportunities for independent livestock businesses have largely disappeared. Only by renewing the nation’s long lost appetite for antitrust enforcement and other legal actions to preserve livestock market competition can the ailing cattle industry be revitalized for future generations.
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