From: <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2002
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: 'If they wanted quality, they'd pay for it,' cattleman says

Farm News from Cropchoice
An alternative news service for American farmers
http://www.cropchoice.com

6/20/02
'If they wanted quality, they'd pay for it,' cattleman says
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Also on CropChoice: Small victory for soybean farmers;
http://www.cropchoice.com/leadstry.asp?recid=755

by Robert Schubert, CropChoice editor

(June 20, 2002 -- CropChoice news) -- It's "all about improving the
overall quality of beef for consumers."  That's what Bill Buckner,
president of Excel Corporation, a Cargill subsidiary, told
http://www.meatingplace.com last week (June 12) about his company's plans to
raise cattle with more tender meat.

Not everyone is convinced this would benefit consumers or family farmers
and ranchers.  They see it instead as a bid for more control and corporate
concentration.

The plan is for Excel's beef packing division and Caprock Cattle Feeders,
also a Cargill subsidiary, to enter a $10 million partnership with
MetaMorphix, Inc., holder of the patent on the cattle genome, to develop
cattle with the desired traits.  Caprock will supply a cross section of
cattle for that purpose.

This will be a "ground breaking step forward for consumers and the beef
industry," the CEO of MetaMorphix told meatingplace.com.

But Mike Callicrate doesn't buy it.

"Cargill is looking at Monsanto's patenting of crop genes and wanting to
do the same with beef," says Callicrate, a Kansas cattleman.  "It's an
attempt to control beef from pasture to the plate."

The fact that IBP, ConAgra, Cargill and Farm Land National control more
than 80 percent of the U.S. steer and heifer slaughter amounts to
monopoly, he says.  This partnership will further reduce family ranchers
and farmers to contract laborers on their own land, much like the poultry
industry.

"They're [Cargill] not happy with controlling just the marketplace.  They
also want to control the genetics and the supply.  If they really wanted
quality, they'd pay [farmers] a fair price for it," says Callicrate adding
that the industry is now buying beef from Australian producers at below
the cost of production, which eventually will drive them out of business.

A better way to produce tender, high quality beef would be to raise free
range, grass-fed cattle that aren't transported thousands of miles, he
says.

Wes Sims, president of the Texas Farmers Union, agrees with the Kansan's
assessment of the Cargill-MetaMorphix partnership.

"Where's the money," Sims asks.  "They don't do anything without more
profit for themselves."

Cargill processes, markets and distributes agricultural, food, financial
and industrial products internationally.  Caprock Cattle Feeders operates
four Kansas and Texas feedlots with 600,000 head of cattle annually.

Source: http://www.meatingplace.com
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