Minnesota beef growers split on proposed federal rules on slaughterhouses

Minnesotans took center stage this week as Congress stepped into the complicated web of beef price regulations in two separate hearings.

On Wednesday, House Agriculture Chair David Scott of Georgia asked representatives of the big, four beef producers — including Cargill CEO David MacLennan — whether they'd established any "agreement" to fix the price of beef, which has skyrocketed for many American families since the start of the pandemic.

Each said "no."

A day earlier in Senate Ag, U.S. Sen. Tina Smith invoked the stories of two Minnesotans — a livestock exchange owner in Bagley and a cow-calf grower outside Finlayson — as exhibits A and B of what's broken in the cattle market.

"The price of hamburger is going up and up and up," said Smith. "Meanwhile the big beef processors — which control 85% of the market — are seeing soaring profits."

Billy Bushelle, co-owner of the sale barn in Bagley, spoke by phone just hours after Tuesday's hearing on a price transparency bill, noting the drought and pandemic wrought unprecedented woe to ranchers in Minnesota.

"Those two combined summers in a row have made it very trying for my cow-calf producers," said Bushelle. "Many have had to liquidate."

Hannah Bernhardt, a cow and sheep grower in Finlayson, said she's side-stepped the pinch other feeders and growers have felt by selling directly to consumers, a rarity in the industry. But she's seen her neighbors paid less for their cattle than it takes to grow them.

"Unless you have the ability to make a website and have the knowledge to direct market, you can't control your prices and you basically take whatever the buyers are going to give," Berhardt told the Star Tribune.

Smith is a cosponsor of the Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act of 2021, introduced by two GOP senators (Iowa's Chuck Grassley and Nebraska's Deb Fischer) and two Democrats (Oregon's Ron Wyden and Montana's Jon Tester).

Prices in the cattle market were volatile during the pandemic, when steaks went missing from grocery stores, meatpacking plants shuttered and Americans stopped eating out. Other so-called "black swan" events, from cyber attacks to a fire at a major beef plant in Kansas, have interrupted a return to normal.

But not all in the industry believe Grassley's bill — which would mandate certain prices — is needed.

"We all know that the cattle [market] is cyclical," said Allison VanDerWal, executive director of the Minnesota Cattlemen's Association. "I remember 2014, 2015 when we had this massive shortage of fed cattle."

One positive trade-off from congressional attention, said VanDerWal, could be additional support for all levels of the industry.

Wednesday's hearing did veer from the line of questioning on beef prices when two GOP congressmen from Arkansas and Georgia pressed Cargill's MacLennan on the Minnetonka-based food giant's year-old equity initiative to increase Black farmer representation.

In repeated instances, MacLennan stood by the program — which offers premium prices or other market opportunities to Black farmers, who've been historically underrepresented in the farming community — by noting that fewer than 1.5% of the nation's farmers are Black.