Opposition Cattlemen’s Groups
Take Fight To Feeding Country

AMARILLO — Amarillo was put on the front lines this month in the war for the hearts and minds of the cattle industry.

R-CALF and the Organization for Competitive Markets brought the livestock price crisis presentations they made in Omaha, Neb., in May to Amarillo last week as they work their way across the nation.

The Texas Cattle Feeders Association, headquartered here, held a brief news conference at Amarillo Livestock Auction on Tuesday last week to discuss topics from the National Cattlemen's Beef Association summer convention the week before in Reno (see related story), and R-CALF and OCM spent Thursday in a local hotel ballroom giving their views on packer concentration and price reporting to about 100 cattlemen. The two groups pointedly attacked national and state cattle organizations that they contend are in bed with packers.

Packer concentration was the focus of most of the meeting, conducted before an audience of cattle feeders, ranchers and commodity brokers from Texas, New Mexico and Kansas.

A poll taken among those attending the meeting found that 62 percent say contract livestock should be eliminated. About 30 percent say livestock should be traded in open markets for contracts. The remainder are fairly evenly split between a reduction in contracted livestock and leaving the situation alone.

The poll indicated that 88 percent favor eliminating packer ownership. About 11 percent want packer ownership reduced. The rest say it should be left alone.

Larry DeSha of DeSha AgriMedia Inc., host of the meeting, said 47 percent of those at the meeting thought the futures market should be eliminated while 42 percent thought it's broken and should be fixed. Eleven percent voted for leaving the futures market alone.

An overwhelming majority, 95 percent, said horizontal concentration in meat packing should be reduced.

A like number, 95 percent, said price reporting by USDA should include all prices by region.

Thursday's program included Dr. Robert Taylor's review of buying power by packers and retailers. Taylor, an agricultural economist at Auburn University, is one of the economists who will be testifying for the cattle industry in the IBP class action lawsuit.

David Domina, the lead attorney in the IBP lawsuit, was at the meeting and said he thinks the case for cattle producers is a strong one. He also said he thinks the best way to get the packers' attention is through the courts, not Congress.

Domina said producers can't outspend packers and their lobbyists in the nation's capitol. Cattlemen, he recommended, should take the fight to the homes of the packers, not to Washington.

Luke Schweiterman, a futures broker, was at the meeting to defend the futures market.

While he admitted that the futures market is not perfect, Schweiterman insisted the problem is with people who abuse the market, not the market itself. He likened it to blaming an accident on a car when it was the driver who was at fault.

Michael Stumo, an Iowa hog farmer turned lawyer and general counsel for the Organization for Competitive Markets, said OCM is more of a think tank than a membership organization.

"We're not that big," Stumo said. "We're bigger in our ideas than in our actual membership."

He said R-CALF is more of the member organization.

"I believe that this industry is worth the efforts that were described here," said Bill Bullard, chief executive officer of R-CALF. "I also believe that we have very little time left to begin making a difference."

Bullard added that while R-CALF and OCM need the financial support of members, they need membership numbers more.

"We need to be able to demonstrate to the decision-makers that we indeed represent the grassroots producers here in West Texas," Bullard explained.

He said on-going litigation, such as the class action lawsuit against IBP, also needs the support of producers.