 Hi there, my name is Haley Sweetland Edwards. I woke up with a cold this morning. So sorry for the sniffles We're gonna follow more or less the same Agenda that we did for the last panel each of our panelists will talk for about five minutes And then we'll have a discussion amongst ourselves, and it'll be opened up to questions from the audience So hold on to them as as people are talking I'd like to introduce everybody we've got Robert Taylor First we speaking first. He's the alpha eminent scholar and professor of agricultural policy at Auburn University Next we'll have Mike Calacrate From the front lines. He's our he's our rancher in Colorado and can talk about what a lot of this consolidation actually looks like for on the on the front lines and and how you can care for animals in The setting next we have Sheila Nichols She's the director of Missouri Food Corps and Ozarks Regional Food Policy Council And she's also been very involved in an effort to build a new locally integrated market system We look forward to hearing about and Last we have Andrew Gunther who is the director of animal welfare approved that stamp a w a that you see on your food Sometimes He's also the former VP of procurement for Whole Foods Clarify was next to VP. Oh, we didn't we had global labels the former Executive global Got it So with that, I guess let's start with Robert Taylor as Patrick Chart showed we've had massive Horizontal concentration at one market level in the global agricultural system, but we've also had massive vertical integration the the dean of the ag law professors now retired Neil Harrell referred to this combination of horizontal concentration and vertical integration as a deadly combination, it's all about power and control controlling the farmer and To some extent the consumer Animals don't matter it's only dollars and To an increasing extent Farmers don't matter that much either. It's really a modern Plantation system. There are numerous social aspects to that. I'm an ag economist not a sociologist we have a couple of sociologists here that know much more about that but This vertical integration system especially in poultry leads to loss in economic freedom for the farmers Loss in consumer choice you walk into a grocery store You know look at the section with bacon and I know in Alabama there may be 15 or 20 brands there and Probably all of them come from Smithfield and probably the same hog from a genetic standpoint feed standpoint same for chickens so a lot of the consumer choice is deceptive in The vertical integration system. There's a lot of contracting. There's extensive contracting between farmers poultry growers and The integrators processors wholesalers. It's very one-sided contract Gross imbalance of economic power and that's where the problem is and then we have Contracting between the processors wholesalers and the retailers the fast food places and the grocery stores and it's evolving to where the retailers are locking in a profit Evolving to where the processors are locking in a profit who's left out of the equation farmers and consumers The Especially in the poultry industry the the captains of industrial farming Really treat growers and farmers as surfs it can be a good relationship and sometimes is and The poultry sector integrated in a matter of two years or so in the 1950s up until the early 90s It was a good deal for growers and growers and the poultry companies known as integrators We're kind of family and they looked out for each other But since then the growers have been squeezed more and more and more and With the squeezing of farmers and ranchers a Law prof at University of Wisconsin by the name of Peter Carstensen says farmers are caught in a vice Because they buy inputs from highly concentrated people with monopoly power and Have to sell or provide products to buyers that have a lot of power. They're squeezed in a vice Telling me doesn't know how to spell. Maybe you should spell it visee and not vi se and at times at times it Can be I've been asked to talk about the tournament Pay system that is widespread use in the poultry industry. It's how growers are paid I Could talk about it at length until your eyes glazed over there are a lot of subtle details but basically in a complex which is a small area surrounding a feed mill and a Processing plant Tyson or pilgrims pride JBS whoever the flocks that are processed in a given week are Put into what is called a tournament and the cost are calculated for each flock and For the growers that have high cost their unit pay Comes down and for those that really have low cost they get a higher unit pay The end result is that the integrator knows exactly what they're paying for all of those chicks the grower pay fluctuates a lot and quite often fluctuation and grower pay is do as much if not more to decisions made by the poultry company Than the growers management So even though economists in the industry call it a tournament to me It's more of a lottery and the problem is it can be a rigged lottery. I'm not saying it always is but but it certainly Certainly can be rigged and settlement sheets growers get they cannot they have absolutely no way of Verifying the numbers used in calculating their pay So there's no transparency Thanks so much Bob a lot of questions there We'll hear from you now Mike. Thanks Thank you my calichrate Colorado Springs, Colorado and st. Francis, Kansas I Mark Dopp being in the room reminds me of those years. I was Many years ago really that I was at the NCBA gatherings and Bruce Bass would go to the microphone and dominate the room He was the head buyer for I B P and and would say absolutely anything I mean and and everyone was so in fear of him that they wouldn't challenge him and and so You know policy at the National Cattleman's Beef Association became very much in favor of the meatpackers over those who produce and and so I just I just That gives me a feeling that I that I don't like to have And it also I think establishes even more in my mind how long the debate has actually been over It is nothing but just empty Crap that comes out of these folks mouths anymore From the from the other side standing up defending the biggest corporations on the planet as if they needed it and And and these are people who are paid to come to this town and do business and of course We pay our own way to come to this town and do business But it was in 1975 that I graduated from Colorado State University with an animal science degree Now that is not to be confused with an animal husbandry degree and of course I got out of there thinking I want to be the biggest cattle feeder in the world and I want to Be efficient and I want to have all the economies of scale and I really thought technology was cool And if Zill max would have been around then I'd been using it But I tell you what I I didn't realize though when I got out of Colorado State University And I built my first feed yard three years later that the big meatpackers had already decided to cooperate rather than compete They'd already got together and said it makes more sense for us to get along than to not get along and They were guided by some some top institutions in this country called the Harvard Law School in that and that in that decision and so Here I am in the fool's game not even realizing it until about 1988 to 1990 when ibp started talking about the formula You know, we were getting out of bed every morning in literally in fear Absolutely in fear many of us in fear for our lives and our livelihoods Under the pressure of these big meatpackers. I went from having 20 meatpackers to sell to in 1978 to having one in 1998 and zero in 1999 when they blackballed me St. Francis of sissy said the way men treat animals is likely the way men will treat other men I Would also say the meant the way men are treated is the way men will treat animals and When I have witnessed the last 30 years the exit of farmers from the land at the rate that we've seen and we've heard those numbers Earlier today the only way that you can get an animal like a sow in a gestation crate Or an egg laying hen in a in a cage less than the size of a notebook piece of paper is To remove the farmer from the land to industrialize agriculture No farmer no real farmer would do that with and especially without the pressure of The price the big packer and their abusive market practices coming down on those farmers in St. Francis, Kansas. We've lost half the kids in our school system Our main street has been decimated by the Walmart in Goodland, Kansas Houses are for sale all up and down the streets of our of our community We've got a handful of a big industrial farms left and They're getting bigger and the farmers are continuing to be driven out of business even today I get up every morning With one thing in mind. How do we increase income at the farm and ranch gate and Produce the very best food possible from our family farms and ranches Thank you Thank You Mike, and I hope everyone's taking notes of questions they have later Sheila you're next. Thanks. Thanks so much for having this I'm from Springfield, Missouri. I'm a small farmer a very small farmer. I work with my neighbors and in cooperation We produce our beef our poultry pork raw milk and produce. I have the land I have the spring we work together. It is a beautiful system, and I know my farmer I know my food I support the people in my community that are doing this and I'm a firm believer as a real food advocate People do want to know people Really want to know where their food is coming from and how it's processed We have seen that in state after state by trying to get bills pushed through labeling Whether it's GMOs or our meat people do want to know they they truly do I came to this as part of the Ag Policy Council in Missouri from HSUS Humane Society of the United States and Missouri right now is really pretty much ground zero for what's happening in big ag versus local ag and family farmer versus factory farming and It has become So apparent to me. I mean almost painful to the point that as I try and promote my local family farmers I am being ostracized by being part of HSUS because everybody needs a boogeyman and When we want to rule from a place of fear That keeps people where they are and from not asking questions You know what I have a nonverbal disabled son that made me the woman I am and I learned to fight for him and I will fight for a fair and just humane Sustainable food system starting at a local level a regional level and a national level The debate is over It's time that we all join forces and that we find our common ground to level the growing field And that's the only way we're gonna do this is to find what we can agree on in Missouri We just last year our Republican legislature overturned the governor's veto Which allowed foreign ownership right now The Chinese company Shanghai that bought out Smithfield owns 50,000 acres in Missouri So basically one out of four pork chops in Missouri is Chinese owned We have a bill right now. That's about to come out of committee that erases Even needing the Department of Agriculture's approval for additional land purchases as long as a company can produce a W9 Which any foreign company as long as they have a US company holding can do We also have when I say ground zero we also have right now coming up in November a Constitutional amendment for the right to farm folks. We already have the right to farm that is protected by a statute this right to farm Constitution will give blanket protection to the gag industry So if this Chinese corporation Moves a huge hog kefo into your little next to your little farm and let's say their lagoon happens to leak Their manure lagoon happens to leak That farmer next to them will have no recourse They will have constitutional protection and I heard it This Missouri is the first state and they are looking to move to other states for Constitutional amendments for the right to farm no other industry would be afforded that protection Maybe we need a right to mine Maybe we need a right to frack It's time that we look out for the health of our bodies our communities our environment The the economic impact and the well-being of our communities our small communities. We're all one We start as little communities and we grow to bigger ones, but the health is in absolute jeopardy and As long as we wait for convenient Not wait as long as we allow for convenience and we don't stand up and do what we need to do Then we will be basically at the mercy of the system. That's in place now as a member of the council I have literally been ostracized and there have been comments made Comparing this comparing me to the atrocities of holocaust and Nazis Because I am fighting for humane sustainable agriculture the message in media is so strong big ass Big ag has such a lock on the mindset on the verbiage on the linguistic shaping and it's time that we all And many of us here are doing that and I want to thank you all for being in this fight and for all that you guys are contributing and You know what we are what we eat And we are what we eat eats So it's time to eat real and it's time to get rid of the status quo and do status grow for the family farmer Thank you for that and our last panelist answer. It's up. Thank you. Good morning Before I start I'm not even going to get into the the ins and outs of the trade agreements and whatever What all I can say is that our agricultural system is broken and My life is somewhat privileged I wake up every morning and I work with about 1700 farmers across 48 states and Canada Who are farming on pasture and range and we ordered those farms from birth to death? But I've met some great people and I was in Aspen because it's a terrible place to be and the scenery is awful And the food is terrible With a guy called Barton Siever who's a guy on fish and what does a fish guy know about agriculture? And the answer is an awful lot, but his phrase and I steal it is farming is the way we interact with our planet And we're not doing a very good job. Are we? Everything we do with food animals is related to our bodies because we eat them and To the land that they survive on or don't as that may be Animal welfare approved has a very specific position in this conversation We are not going to attack farmers. We think that's the wrong thing to do farmers are the custodians of the countryside What we'd like to do is to divorce farming and farmers from the large corporations that pretend to be farmers or farming But we all have to take responsibility for the position. We're in right now We are a free market society We allow the snake oil salesman to continue We listen to what they have to say and when somebody says put a label on it We have a big pushback that says no no no you should start your own farm and make your own label Well, I want to be really clear that things like feedlots and confinement feeding are not sustainable either for the animal or For the environment or for the community or for human health They cause E. Coli. They cause salmonella the abuse of antibiotics is causing antibiotic resistant and yesterday We had a big conversation about the new FDA regulation and the interest groups were out in full force Because there are groups that say that we should not use Antibiotics without a vet and there are farmers that don't have vets and I use this analogy because it's hot to trot There are a lot of groups that said you have to have a vet AWA stood up and said hey, we've got farmers who are brilliant farmers They're outdoors on pasture and range their animals very rarely get sick their experts and they need access to antibiotics But the interest groups got involved So the issue actually got confused So there's the potential to hurt good farmers in order to change the way big ag Once their animals to be produced So I think our interest today is to say there is another way within the free market And that's to bring audited third-party labeling honest open transparent labeling and a question I ask often I'm sure you all know the answer What does natural mean in the terms of the USDA FSIS definition? Do we think it means animals are outdoors on pasture and range anybody think that natural would mean that wave your hand in there If you think that's a good definition Natural so no yeah, let me give you the definition of natural as it applies from FSIS Minimally processed to words when you see natural on a meat product. It means minimally processed That's all it means no more no less And if we're allowing those labels to appear on our meat and we get into cool And one of the reasons with cool that it's difficult particularly if you've got grind and We've got a global meat industry and we do this is our drive for cheap food And I call it so-called cheap food Okay, we export Whole muscle to another country to have it converted into nuggets and sent back because in a dollar value in a nickel-and-dime society That's profitable But if we add in the real cost of carbon the real cost of human abuse in Packing plants the real cost of farmer abuse in terms of some of the contracts that are incredibly abusive That food is amazingly expensive and until we the people in this room get up as consumers and Pay the real price of food to real farmers the system will not change no matter how broken we think it is Thank you Thank you so much all of our panelists here I have I think many more questions then Then we can fit into the next five or ten minutes, but I Had the pleasure of sitting next to Andrew last night at dinner and we talked a lot about The solutions to this problem because those of us who are interested in this field that can just feel Just so overwhelming so much of it is is broken from You know sustainability and nutrition and obesity and the welfare of animals and all of these things and and This panel is specifically addressing the welfare of the animal so I wanted to Sort of jump off what Andrew said at the end there about we can still have a free market model, but use Effective labeling to Correct the marketplace. I wanted to know what the other panelists thought especially Robert Who can talk a little bit more about the tournament system and how that is how that puts the farmer in advice but also Forces farmers to treat their animals in a certain way Thank you. Oh, okay In contract poultry production the grower this so-called contract farmer Makes very few decisions they have to go through the house daily Make sure there's feed water Environmental conditions correct pick up dead birds and so forth, but they make essentially no critical decisions About what's going on the integrator poultry company owns the bird They own the feed They decide How many chicks we'd be delivered when they will be delivered? They own the feed They make the feed deliveries they make the decisions when the type of feed will be changed as the bird matures They decide when the bird will be picked up and processed so that the grower has a very Not not many Options available on how the birds are treated treated it is the integrator that decides how many birds about 1.25 per square foot so one bird has about this much space in a house So You know the animal welfare issue is controlled largely by the poultry company and not by the farmer grower And Sheila in your home state of Missouri, there's Your attorney general is going after some of the changes that California is attempting to make in that Can you talk a little bit about that? Yes, um Chris coster our attorney general has filed suit against California because of their egg laws Because California has decided that they want their eggs to come from chickens that have a more chickenly way of being You know We feel that like I said earlier you are what you eat and you are what you eat eats and How they live and the people of California have decided that they want their chickens to have a more humane environment They feel it's going to be healthier Less salmonella less E. Coli less back to less antibiotic use and Chris coster along with five other states have now joined suit in suing California stating that it's Pardon me it goes against the competitive clause for the states to be able to sell and So it's going to be very interesting to see Just to be really clear that there isn't an antibiotic usage in laying hands. They don't use antibiotics in production laying hands And and just also to be completely clear the Californian prop 2 is to increase the size of a cage minusculely and add a perch So for those of us that get chickens, we're not convinced. That's a humane way forward, but it's really interesting to see Industry fighting back using trade laws To block what is potentially a move forward But if we put labels on that product and said that this is from a caged hand There is some European research that states people eat less eggs if it says caged hand on it You know, I wonder what they do if there was a picture of a sow and a farrowing crepe on their pork chop You know, I mean can we drive the market by some honesty and transparency and understand I keep saying this I'm not railing on farmers real farmers try to do the best they can in the business They're in they're trying to pay their college fees for their kids. We had a farmer in Washington state And I don't want to to rail on this too much Who made the choice between buying health care for their family and buying farm insurance? So if we have a benefactor in the room, they need $35,000 to rebuild their bond It's sadly burnt down because they chose health insurance over, you know So there's some real issues at that farmer level that we've got to address and we can address it with transparency You know, if we get the journalists in this room to talk about how an animal is in produce without it being inflammatory You know, we mustn't be inflammatory. We mustn't want to stop farming. We mustn't have an anti meat agenda We must allow farmers to make a living But if we can show how animals are being produced and the net result on the planet if you're interested if you're green by that sort of meat if you're Into your own health By that sort of meat or if you're into the animal welfare, maybe you don't eat meat at all But as long as we're transparent our market should work And Mike I'd like to hear from you on this as well. Do you you said something interesting about 1975 you had 20 meat packers to choose from and by 1988 I think it was you had one and by 99 there were zero But how has that affected your business and and the welfare of your animals? Well, it was 98 I had one okay, and in 99 I had zero And it affected my treatment of animals severely because I didn't have any I emptied out my feedlot it was Done it was a big empty place 15 people lost their jobs and went to town and And it had a big impact on our community but We found a solution we found a way around it and and it's called a company wrench foods direct that I got angry I guess at the big meat packers, and I said I'll tell you what I'm going to do I'm going to produce my own meat and it's not going to be based on this industrial model and When you eat my meat, I'm going to be responsible for it, and I'm going to do the very best job I can of producing it and Absolutely, I'm going to treat these animals With dignity and respect and in a very humane way because the fact is when you do that It makes more money. Yeah, it works better and and in fact industrial agriculture does not work It simply doesn't work without a whole bunch of subsidies, and I and I'm with Andrew I'm saying why do we call these guys farmers at all? They aren't farmers. They're they're corporations with a lot of refugee workers. I mean How many languages do you have to speak in a typical big meat-packing plan to communicate or? A hog farm and why in the world that our kids want to come back to a factory hog farm? To work and and and to resume the life that that the parents had had led in such desperation And so I'm all about rebuilding a food system around sustainable restorative practices Around humane treatment of animals and nothing but really the very best food that's possible to produce But it's really really hard and we hear Bob Taylor talk about the predators in the marketplace And if we don't control the predators in this marketplace the monopolies that mark Dopp and Janet Riley stand up for every day We cannot build the alternative food system. They will snuff it out They will crush it and when I go up against every day in Colorado Springs with Cisco Coming in and in predatory pricing paying Kickbacks to chefs and to kitchen managers and the lies that come out from these big Food companies like Cisco who's now buying US Foods Justice Department. What are you gonna do about that one? We don't have a hope because family because Farmers markets are great, but what farmers really need is a market Thank you. I think in my last question and then I'll open up to the audience and one thing we all of us keep touching on here is a theory of change and Andrews talked a lot about transparency and labeling things like that But I think that what a lot of you have alluded to is a collective action problem so when it comes to labeling and people making choices about their meat and It that will inevitably skew towards maybe wealthier consumers those who can afford to Go to Whole Foods those to afford to read the back of of their boxes and I wonder what all of you think and I'll open up to the whole panel about what needs to happen Maybe politically what needs to happen? Besides journalists here talking about some of the issues that you're addressing We have the conversation last night. Let's get home economics back in schools Let's teach people to cook and part of home economics is knowing the nutritional value of your food How to make best value of it and we don't need four pounds of chicken to feed a family of two in one night You know, we can go back to that system And I'm a guy trying to get back from pre-diabetic and all sorts of other health issues because I've eaten too much garbage food And I'm really good at it. I've run through an airport and grab this and grab that but you know We've got to do that So I think bringing home back into schools would be a really good idea and for all the big-ag companies Why don't you go ahead and fund it and sponsor it be a really good idea show your credentials? amongst other things like I think I think we're doing a lot that Food Inc. I think in my view was a turning point for people's understanding How broken our food system is and and you know, I suggested at a gathering once that Wall Street ran off with the loaf of bread and we're all fighting over the crumbs and and but we were also talking about You know farmers markets and people, you know trying to build this new food system stuff And one of the women in the in the audience says well I'd suggested we've got to get much more active in politics and we got to get good policy And she says that heck with Washington corporations control it Let's just bake our own bread and I said, you know what if you bake your own bread though, and you're not engaged Bacon bread will be illegal. And so you do have to get engaged We do have to have better policy and we all have to become citizens again Barry Lynn's message Transition yourself from that aggressive price shopping consumer to being a citizen Does that feel good to hear and do perhaps The country's run by those who show up I firmly believe it and Once you know you can't unknow about your food. I'll never forget the first time I saw The pictures and now that the ag-gag bills are coming out. It is trying to limit that view for people Once people know once they see it. I truly think I can't I can't buy meat That's a story any longer. I probably buy 40% of all my food locally. I know where everything comes from not everything but of what I buy locally I know how it's raised but truly we have got to quit being so lazy and Convenient as the nation the health of our bodies our communities our economy our environment depend upon it and when we show up Stand up Then then we have control and we feel much more in control of ourselves in our environment And we don't have to live in that place of fear. You can either choose a place of love or a place of fear and I choose love Robert do you want to say anything on that or should I open it up? Okay, I'll say one thing in general It's ironic that many of the ag business corporations When they were much smaller they owed their success to offering what consumers wanted and they made a big deal about that We're successful because we're offering what consumers won't and they did Now they're spending billions to tell you what you should want you want GMOs You want this chicken you want this hog and so forth Well, we have about a little over 15 minutes here So I'm going to open it up to the audience. Please say your name and your affiliation my name is Roberta Stanley and I've worked for the state of Michigan and I worked on the house head and labor committee on child nutrition programs And they're a great beneficiary of commodities and so forth. We tried to change a little bit at one point, but Since they're a great consumer and they can kind of drive policy Given that the school systems are some of the great users of the food Would you address some of the issues that might enter into that discourse that you've been having and also? It's it's human ecology now and you're right if we direct children on how to eat better as young people that ties into my earlier question They do that throughout life Michael take this one. Yeah, I really like that question In Colorado Springs at district 11 Rick Hughes is the food manager on in the school system It's the largest in southern Colorado. They serve 25,000 meals a day or so and Rick used to work for Sodexo years ago And and the board of district 11 came to Rick Hughes one day about six or seven years ago And they said hey Rick, you know, we really like you, but we don't like your company Sodexo Would you consider coming to work for us and doing the in-house food management program in Rick Hughes said yes? Well, one of the first people who came to it was myself with French food direct and said can you supply beef to our school? And I said wow absolutely I would love I would love to do that and and over a period of time Rick is Eliminate the processed foods in that school and and eliminated all the chemicals and and buys as much as Possibly can I mean we got the Arkansas Valley 38 miles south that a lot of fruits and a lot of vegetables mostly the fruits are over the mountain But but we've got a The school is the center of an education piece not only not only for the kids But but how about all those people he taught to cook in the school kitchens? I mean we've got some great support with live well Colorado now Getting behind this effort, but I don't know of anywhere in the country That's further ahead in this issue than Rick Hughes with district 11 in Colorado Springs And so he's a very very key component in in building that food system and and Rick is Teaching others as well now and so the folks that Rick that used to work with Rick initially have left and been Given better jobs in Greeley, Colorado, which now is doing what Rick is doing We've got the Boulder School District and Cooper you many of you know and Cooper She's doing it. We've got some really cool things happening And so the school lunches is a big big opportunity But the problem is is infrastructure available Within these places to be able to provide that local food And so we've got to rebuild a lot of infrastructure that the big meatpackers have eliminated over the years through their through their Predatory practices and and it's going to be very very hard and we have to come together as communities to build these things as communities Please just jump in well I mean we've we've been working with school districts and hospital districts across the US and the issue Fundament is the price given to buy the meal If you're looking at a buck 60 or buck 50 and that's you'll you'll you'll price to buy a meal That's what you're done Mike sort of put the point that it's the big meatpackers that have moved the kitchens out of schools It isn't it's budgets It's a group of folks like ourselves on the school board that try and balance our budget and we can get a meal For a buck 40 in a box rather than two and a half dollars But there are some innovative ways to do and if you guys want to have a go at it will come and work with you and try and find Farmers it'll do it, but it means Decreasing portion size because if you're going to pay more for a different quality You're going to have to have a slightly smaller portion size We fed 1500 people in the food bank in New York at less than a buck 29 ahead using heritage turkey and local grown potatoes But we had to have a chef To take that raw commodity and turn it into an edible dish We don't have enough chefs in schools anymore. They're gone, but we again We're responsible for going back to this bottom dollar if we want our school districts to function as a sort of Low-hanger on our on our state our city budget Well, you're gonna have cheap food if we say to that our kids are our future Let's give our school more food food budget. We'll get better food It's math the whole thing is based on dollars, but we'd come and work with you in a heartbeat We got farmers that love to supply you. I just like to Bring it to the point that in the child nutrition program reauthorizations There's a farm-to-school link and program and one of the most Forthright and upbeat programs actually was in New York City the largest Server of food but throughout the country where we do produce food those farm-to-school programs are being Very very successful, and I know like the chair of the Senate Ag Committee Debbie Stavnau throughout her career She grew up on a farm. She's been promoting them as has spread up to the chairman of the energy and commerce committee in the house Thank you Like what's jumping here, you know Andrew brings up a good point about the cost of this food But I thought what was really interesting about district 11 Andrew was in the very first year and their very first attempt at going local and Getting rid of Sodexo. They saved $250,000 and that's buying the good food Today that number is a half a million dollars in savings over what Sodexo would have cost And so there that that is not always true But in the other cool thing that's happening now in Colorado Springs is University of Colorado Colorado Springs is combined with the University of Colorado Medical Medical School and They've decided to kick out Sodexo and go local and employ 75 students Learning how to cook and work in that those kitchens And so now we've got another major university that has gone local as well as CC made the switch to bone Appetite and away from Sodexo. So this is really Exciting stuff that you can actually save money by kicking out the the big food service companies And if the big food companies didn't have all those subsidies to begin with to produce that and all the tax benefits that they get To do that and then when those Products don't sell on the shelves and get put back into the food banks that get put back serving the poor people and communities Then there's another tax break there. So I think that we really need to look at the cost of These meals from the very beginning of the subsidies and Just briefly Sodexo. They're a full service. They're not a distributor I think my concern as we get the two confused We do need distribution and large companies are really efficient at it And if we're going to feed some of our rural schools We might want to think really careful about what support structures we get rid of because we still have to get Food to to smaller communities But I think getting rid of something like Sodexo who profit from making it in every part It's a really good idea, but I think US foods are now very much moving into moving Sustainable product. They're in this market right now looking for farmers. The issue is volume You know and my previous employment, you know farmers would come to me with one cow a week and say hey we want to supply you Understand most meat cases move five or six whole cattle a day You know so there is a volume issue and an insurance issue and a repeatability issue We can't just fix this with a little small farm bolting on so I mean I'm not in favor of Sodexo at all But I don't want us to kick out the distributors. They're really efficient at it all the more reason for food hubs and Developing things like that to do the distribution and aggregation of local food. Great. Let's have another question Yeah, Bruce Friedrich from Farm Sanctuary and just to clarify the situation with Sheila's Attorney General Chris Coster and the dispute between Missouri and California the Proposition to is not the law. That's that's under dispute and proposition to says that Animals should be able to stand up spread their wings and turn around without coming in contact with another animal and The industry is trying to frame that as saying that it still allows cages But it very clearly doesn't allow cages So we probably don't want to find ourselves in a situation in which we're seeding something fairly important Proposition to past with more votes than any other proposition in California history and the people who voted for it thought that they were voting for cage-free and The law that Chris Coster is suing over under the Commerce Clause should have the same effect as proposition to it's AB 1437 and it says that eggs cannot be sold in the state of California Unless they're compliant with the same standards as Prop 2, but it's the big agribusiness industry That's trying to say this still allows cages And it really very clearly doesn't Thanks for that clarification. Thank you Let's have another question in the back there Thank you, I'm Dave level I'm one of those pathetic serfs who is entrapped by the big major corporations on the poultry business 22 years ago. I was Struggling to make a living and my mother suggested I take a look at the poultry business I did eventually got into it now 22 years later. I probably I'd earn most of the people in the room. I I Also am an environmentalist. I work with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation I yesterday in the day before hosted a tour from three poultry growers from the Shenandoah Valley All three of them told me and they all three raised poultry for different companies that poultry is what keeps their operations profitable so You know that this this complaint about the tournament system I'm incredibly happy about the tournament system I work harder and I do a better job than most of the other growers in my area And I make more money as a result of it do to eliminate the tournament system would bring in basically pure Socialism to pay us all equally because if I'm gonna make the same amount of money as the guy down the road Who's not getting up in the middle of the night to take care of the alarm call when something goes wrong The chicken eyes why should I get up in the middle of night and take care of the alarm call? There goes your animal welfare welfare right at the window. I work harder. I do a better job. I make more money I'm damn glad of the tournament system. I Would I'd like to have actually Robert or Mike respond to that one maybe Robert first I'm sure you can find growers like you that are happy, but all available Objective information on cost and returns to contract poultry production done with proper Managerial accounting not tax accounting Show that most years the average contract grower loses money after you take out a very modest Fee for unpaid labor Basically minimum wage Are you including the fact that depreciation on the farm falsely lowers the income of the farm? It's a phantom Expense specifically the best set of information available Comes out of the Alabama Farm Business Analysis Association, which I have absolutely nothing to do with It was recently terminated by extension, which is a sore point with many of us but it's where an Ag economist with a graduate degree sits down with the growers And goes through all of their records for Managerial accounting they also do the tax accounting, which is much different and Over the ten years or so that they have summarized that they do this very carefully you know most poultry operations have cattle and maybe a few crops and they Properly apportion this but it shows that I Don't remember the exact number but three out of four years. They have actually lost money Yes, I'm saying they do the complete managerial accounting all of that is available on exactly how it's done Let me make one more point USDA has morning and afternoon cattle and hog reports USDA has absolutely nothing on the average pay even the gross pay the contract pay of poultry producers they have a few little snapshots, but there's not even an annual series on that so there's A lot of information that is not available in public But the integrators through a common reporting service share this with each other But it's not available to the public So I know that we're going to get back to the tournament system later in a different panel today So I want to Sort of loop back to the welfare of the animal and how consolidation is affecting that one thing that we talked a lot about last night was the alliance between organizations like the Humane Society of the United States and independent ranchers cattlemen and farmers and that is a Odd bedfellows sort of relationship Sometimes and I'd like to have our panelists talk a little bit about that and and sort of maybe the the positives that could come out of that for animal welfare Abraham Lincoln after the Civil War said that More than the war itself He was in fear of corporate concentration in the consolidated wealth into the hands of a few and he said that Corporations will work upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is in their hands We've been divided for a long time on our prejudices Especially in agriculture American Meat Institute the National Cattleman's beef Association Wants to put people like me out in front as a shield sort of as a human shield So they can look like a farmer or a rancher. I should have wore my hat perhaps So you get the picture better But but the fact is that if we don't work together We all have a common interest and that is Healthy soil Animals that are treated humanely. I mean we have an environment that we should care about. I mean rural Prosperity farmers that earn living and the living incomes and we have all this in common and so We need in fact to work together corporate power today is is far beyond President Lincoln's wildest Imagination he would have never have guessed that we would have made a full return to the robber baron era He would have never have guessed that and the only way we can address this power is with power And that's people working together with common interest of course We may not all agree on everything of course We don't but when there are things we do agree on as citizens we should be cooperating Thanks Mike. I think I want to make one thing really clear that the myth that keeps being thrown at me is that HS us wants to end all animal agriculture. They want everybody to be vegans and vegetarians Not the case I'm wearing leather. I eat meat. I eat all kinds of meat So do a good portion of the members of HS us There are hundreds of thousands of members across this country that care about humane treatment of animals that care about their environment and health and It is a perfect Alignment with HS us like we were saying you might not agree on everything. Let's find our common ground and our common ground is Bringing back our farms bringing back healthy soil. We don't have a planet be So they're they're great bedfellows. Thanks to you. All right. Well, that's it for our panel here I'm sorry Andrew and Robert. You didn't get a last word Thanks so much for for your time and here's Barry again