Tester livestock bills pass out of committee

Staff and wire

During a press call last week, Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., said a committee advanced two of his bills intended to improve prices and fairness for agricultural producers and consumers, putting them one step closer to a vote on the Senate floor.

Last Wednesday, the Senate Agriculture Committee favorably reported the bipartisan Meat Packing Special Investigator Act and the Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act, intended to combat consolidation in the meat industry, protect family farmers and ranchers, lower prices for consumers, and ensure America’s food security.

In the press call, Tester said many of Montana’s producers are bracing for a difficult harvest, and he is trying to improve market conditions and soften that blow, including tackling consolidation in the meat packing industry.

He said that Montana ranchers have been telling him for years that it is becoming harder and harder financially for them to operate.

“Generational ranchers are being forced to sell their land or operate at a loss, and a lack of competition in the meatpacking industry is a main reason why,” Tester said. “You’ve heard me talk about these bills, but my Meat Packing Special Investigator Act and my Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act are going to finally put some competition back in the market place.

“We don’t want to take down the big packers, but we do want to increase transparency and competition in the market by enforcing existing antitrust laws, so we can get to the core of the problem,” he added. “We can’t afford to let massive multi-national corporations continue to price gouge consumers while ripping off our family ranchers, and now that these bills are out of committee, we’re one step closer to getting them to the Senate floor for a vote. Once passed, these bills will finally be able to ensure that our cattle producers are able to remain viable and folks won’t have to sell the farm to stay afloat.”

Montana Farmers Union praised the committee’s advancing the bills.

“MFU appreciates the work Sen. Jon Tester has put into getting the Special Investigator and the Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency acts to this point,” MFU President Walter Schweitzer said in a release. “This is a bipartisan effort to rein in the packers. For too long, the packers have been taking advantage of the consumers and ranchers by price gouging them both. These acts will shed light on their anti-competitive activities and give the DOJ and the USDA the tools to hold them accountable.”

The bills’ passage from committee was hailed by National Farmers Union as a sign of momentum on issues facing farmers and ranchers after decades of consolidation in the livestock industry. These bills, paired with the recent House passage of the Lower Food and Fuel Costs Act are great strides forward in NFU’s work for Fairness for Farmers.

Through its Fairness for Farmers campaign, NFU has been working to bring many of the issues addressed by this legislation into the national spotlight, including pushing back against corporate monopolies, broadening market opportunities, expanding processing capabilities, and addressing supply chain vulnerabilities.

“Farmers Union has been advocating for the family farmer for over 100 years, and this is just one more example how a united voice can make a difference,” Schweitzer said. 

Tester’s Meat Packing Special Investigator Act, introduced with Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Mike Rounds, R-S.D., would create the “Office of the Special Investigator for Competition Matters” within the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The new USDA special investigator will have a team of investigators, with subpoena power, dedicated to preventing and addressing anticompetitive practices in the meat and poultry industries and enforcing our nation’s antitrust laws. They will coordinate and act in consultation with the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission and create a new bridge between the USDA and the Department of Homeland Security to protect the continuation of the food supply and increase our national security. With a team of dedicated staff, the USDA will now have the ability to investigate the tough issues facing producers and hold bad actors accountable.

Tester’s Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act, imtroduced with Sens. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., Grassley, and Ron Wyden, R-Ore., would:

1. Require the secretary of agriculture to establish five to seven regions encompassing the entire continental U.S. and then establish minimum levels of fed cattle purchases made through approved pricing mechanisms. Approved pricing mechanisms are fed cattle purchases made through negotiated cash, negotiated grid, at a stockyard, and through trading systems that multiple buyers and sellers regularly can make and accept bids. These pricing mechanisms will ensure robust price discovery.

2. Establish a maximum penalty for covered packers of $90,000 for mandatory minimum violations. Covered packers are defined as those packers that during the immediately preceding five years have slaughtered five percent or more of the number of fed cattle nationally.

3. The bill also includes provisions to create a publicly available cattle contract library, mandating box beef reporting to ensure transparency, expediting the reporting of cattle carcass weights, and requiring a packer to report the number of cattle scheduled to be delivered for slaughter each day for the next 14 days. The contract library would be permanently authorized and specify key details about the contents that must be included in the library like the duration of the contract and provisions in the contract that may impact price such as schedules, premiums and discounts, and transportation arrangements.

As the only working farmer in the U.S. Senate, Tester has long been an advocate for increased market transparency and more competitive practices for Montana producers and consumers. Earlier this year, Tester introduced his Agriculture Right to Repair Act to finally guarantee farmers the right to repair their own equipment and end current restrictions on the repair market. Last year, he introduced his bipartisan American Beef Labeling Act, which would ensure that only beef raised in the United States is labeled as a product of the USA, and his bipartisan New Markets for State-Inspected Meat and Poultry Act, which allows meat and poultry products inspected by Food Safety Inspection Service approved state Meat and Poultry Inspection programs to be sold across state lines.

Information about the Meat Packing Special Investigator Act can be found online at https://www.tester.senate.gov/files/documents/Special%20Investigator%20One-Pager.pdf .

The full text and actions on the bill can be found on congress.gov at https://bit.ly/3u80Tvt .

Information about the Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act can be found online at https://www.tester.senate.gov/files/documents/cattle-market-transparency-one-pager-updated-2-.pdf .

The full text and actions on the bill can be found on congress.gov at https://bit.ly/3yrfEMi .