USDA Posts Guidance on Packers Stockyards Enforcement

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USDA Posts Guidance on Packers & Stockyards Enforcement

by Tom Johnston, meatingplace.com

The Agricultural Marketing Service has issued new guidance, in the form of frequently asked questions (FAQs), that offers insight into how USDA intends to enforce the Packers and Stockyards Act (PSA) under the Biden administration.

The FAQs follow the administration’s issuance of a final rule and more recent series of executive orders aimed at increasing competition in the U.S. economy, including one promising new rules under the PSA that primarily would make it easier for farmers to sue packers for giving “undue or unreasonable preference” to other farmers.

In June, USDA said specifically it would propose three new rules to beef up the PSA. One would strengthen the agency’s enforcement on undue preferences; one would propose a new poultry grower tournament system; and one would make it easier for the agency to bring enforcement actions. The FAQs are intended to offer guidance while the agency works on the new rulemakings.

In addition to explaining the Biden administration’s general policy direction, the FAQs lay out industry-specific circumstances for how USDA will address complaints in the poultry, cattle and hog markets.

Examples include: Ї When a poultry company threatens to terminate a grower’s contract if the grower refuses to make facility upgrades. Ї When a beef packer buys one farmer’s cattle on a negotiated spot market live basis and a neighboring farmer’s cattle on the packer’s standard marketing formula, despite the farmers’ animals having the same quality. Ї When a pork packer allegedly retaliates against a contract pig grower because that grower expresses concerns to the media or public officials about how waste is being handled by neighboring growing operations. ▫