|
Billings, Mont.—Western
ranchers are applauding legislation introduced today to return competition
and fairness to the nation’s cattle markets.
Wyoming Senator Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) has introduced the Captive Supply
Reform Act, S. 1017, with bipartisan support. The bill would limit
meatpacker control of the cattle market by requiring more transparent
transactions and firm base prices for cattle supplied under advance
contracts. Four multi-national packing firms control the markets,
in part through captive supplies, or cattle owned or contracted
by the packers.
“It’s time for Congress to step up to the plate and
support Sen. Enzi’s reforms,” said Mabel Dobbs, a rancher
from Weiser, Idaho, and chair of the Livestock Committee for the
Billings-based Western Organization of Resource Councils. “Ranchers
want and deserve to earn a fair price in an open, competitive livestock
market.”
Dobbs said the packers use captive supplies to manipulate the price
paid to family farmers and ranchers for their livestock for nearly
20 years. “It’s time to fix the livestock markets,”
she said.
“Meatpackers profit at the expense of hard-working producers
by controlling prices,” said Dan Teigen, a member of Montana’s
Northern Plains Resource Council and the WORC Livestock Committee.
“Senator Enzi’s proposal is a market-based solution
that restores competition to the packer-controlled livestock markets
we face today. This change would cost virtually nothing for the
federal government to implement, but would pay dividends to rural
communities throughout this country. Every senator with cattle in
his or her state should support this bill.”
Cosponsors are Senators Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), Kent Conrad (D-N.D.),
Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and Craig Thomas (R-Wyo.).
“Ranchers owe a big ‘thank you’ to these senators
for their efforts to regain a true livestock market,” Dobbs
said.
|
