Representative Angie Craig, Colleagues Urge Biden Administration to Take Additional Steps to Support Small and Regional Meat & Poultry Processing Facilities

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, U.S. Representatives Angie Craig (D-MN), Dusty Johnson (R-SD), Chellie Pingree (D-ME) and Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) led 26 of their House colleagues in urging the Biden Administration to take additional steps to address the consolidation of the meat and poultry processing sector that has negatively impacted the ability for farmers and ranchers to get their product to market.

In a letter addressed to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Tom Vilsack, the Members applauded USDA's recent announcement of a $500 million investment to expand capacity and increase competitiveness in the meat and poultry processing sector – while imploring the Administration to make additional efforts to support small and regional processing facilities across the country.

"For some farmers and ranchers right now, slaughter and processing dates must be booked up to two years in advance. Meanwhile, small processors continue to struggle with barriers to expansion like a lack of capital or financing options, workforce shortages, and an increasingly complex regulatory structure," wrote the Members."We encourage USDA to make investments that will provide leverage for producers at all levels of the supply chain."

"The pandemic revealed the country's highly consolidated meat processing sector creates vulnerabilities to supply," said Mike Lorentz, CEO of Lorentz Meats based in Cannon Falls, MN. "We believe strengthening regional small players that can distribute into conventional supply chains will help create a more resilient food system. We would appreciate any support USDA could provide plants like ours."

To build on recent efforts to increase competitiveness in the industry and expand slaughter and processing capacity, the Members requested that the Biden Administration:

1. Ensure small and regional meat and poultry processors can access the grant funds necessary to expand their infrastructure, increase productivity and explore new technologies to support and grow their businesses.

2. Provide more generous and accessible financing options for meat and poultry processors across the country to immediately expand industry-wide shackle space and capacity.

3. Provide grants to help train new meat and poultry industry workers – which would help the sector create well-paying rural jobs, improve local and regional markets, improve farm incomes, address labor challenges and increase food system resilience.

Representatives Craig, Johnson, Pingree and Fortenberry were joined in sending the letter by Representatives Troy Balderson, Ed Case, Marcy Kaptur, Kaiali'i Kahele, Randy Feenstra, James Baird, Cindy Axne, Sanford Bishop, Abigail Spanberger, Jahana Hayes, Antonio Delgado, Kim Schrier, Ann Kuster, Vicky Hartzler, David Rouzer, Barry Moore, Kat Cammack, Michelle Fishbach, Betty McCollum, Adrian Smith, Dan Newhouse, Kelly Armstrong, Clay Higgins, Robert Latta, Warren Davidson, and Pete Stauber.

The Members' initiative is supported by the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, the National Farmers Union, and the American Farm Bureau Federation.

You can find the full text of the letter

and copied below.

July 29, 2021

The Honorable Tom Vilsack

Secretary

United States Department of Agriculture

1400 Independence Ave SW

Washington, DC 20250

Dear Secretary Vilsack:

Thank you for your focus on addressing supply chain resiliency at all levels of the U.S. food system. We write regarding the U.S. Department of Agriculture's recent announcement about its plans to invest more than $500 million to support new competitive entrants in meat and poultry processing, strengthen the resiliency of U.S. food systems, and further the Department's commitment to expanding existing food processing capacity.

First, thank you for responding to the needs of small and very small processors by addressing overtime fees as outlined in the Small Packer Overtime and Holiday Fee Relief for COVID–19 Act of 2020. The $100 million investment will go a long way to leveling the playing field for smaller processors.

Second, we appreciate your focus on small and regional processors in this $500 million investment, and we agree that it should be a top priority of the Department to help address the bottlenecks in the meat and poultry supply chain. Capacity at federal and state inspected facilities is at a premium. For some farmers and ranchers right now, slaughter and processing dates must be booked up to two years in advance. Meanwhile, small processors continue to struggle with barriers to expansion like a lack of capital or financing options, workforce shortages, and an increasingly complex regulatory structure. We encourage USDA to make investments that will provide leverage for producers at all levels of the supply chain, including in industries that are less vertically integrated, like the cattle industry, and industries that are more vertically integrated, like the poultry and pork industries.

In order to successfully expand small meat and poultry processing in the U.S. and address the bottleneck issues that currently exist, we request that USDA incorporate the following recommendations into its plans for the recently announced grants to support small and regional meat and poultry processing facilities:

• We strongly encourage USDA to ensure small and regional federally inspected and State Cooperative Interstate Shipment Program meat and poultry plants can access grant funds to expand their infrastructure, increase automation, and explore new technologies as part of the Department's $500 million investment. USDA should implement a small plant infrastructure grant program as part of their plan to invest in regional processing capacity. The grant program would help small plants cover the costs of compliance with state or federal inspection and expand infrastructure to increase slaughter and processing capacity.
  
• We strongly encourage USDA to also offer higher-cap, scalable financing options. We strongly encourage USDA to focus investments and producer and cooperative financing on plants that can be competitive long-term and quickly address the shortage of shackle space we currently face.
  
• We strongly urge USDA to expand outreach to stakeholders on existing programs that facilitate local food processing. We also strongly encourage USDA to provide competitive grants for community colleges, technical or vocational schools, land grant colleges or universities, non-land grant colleges of agriculture, and small plants to help train new meat and poultry processors and workers and allow coordination with existing community technical assistance providers. These grants would help the sector create well-paying rural jobs, improve local and regional markets, improve farm incomes, address labor challenges, and increase food system resilience.

We thank you and the entire team at USDA for your efforts to support farmers, ranchers, and small processors as they recover from the impacts of COVID-19. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you have any questions, and we appreciate your consideration of these recommendations.