Federal regulators probe beef market: It's about time

Where were the federal regulators when it counted?

No, we're not talking about the regulators who were watching porn on the Internet while rogue bankers went wild; we're talking about the new probe by the Justice and Agriculture Departments into meat pricing.

St. Francis cattleman Mike Callicrate won a $1.28 billion judgment against Tyson in 2004, eight years after it was filed, but the issue is far from settled.

Over the last 15 years, several thousand ranchers were forced out of business every year, resulting in the smallest U.S. cow herd in decades and striking at the heart of cattle country.

The new probe is looking into whether meatpackers -- the largest are Tyson Foods, JBS, Cargill and National Beef , who control 80 percent of U.S. beef -- are illegally or unfairly driving down cattle prices by avoiding the cash market and buying most of their cattle on contract directly from the producers.

Smaller feedlots and ranchers who don't have deals with the large meatpackers are hurting, prices down 5 percent over the past two decades.

They point to the Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921, which was designed to ensure fair competition and protect farmers and ranchers from discriminatory, monopolistic practices by meatpackers, but which they say has long been ignored.

A recent screening of the "Food Inc." documentary on NET Television, along with local reaction by Nebraska producers, pointed out that the problem pervades more than just the meat industry.

Several of them are enjoying success in niches like the organic market and the growing locally-produced food markets.

U.S. consumers enjoy low-cost food, and many have no clue what it takes to put it on the table. But allowing small producers to be driven out of business by market manipulation allowed by a politically influenced lack of oversight is harmful to all of us.