Free Republic

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Like other ranchers across the country, Rusty Kemp for years grumbled about rock-bottom prices paid for the cattle he raised in central Nebraska, even as the cost of beef at grocery stores kept climbing. He and his neighbors blamed it on consolidation in the beef industry stretching back to the 1970s that resulted in four companies slaughtering over 80% of the nation’s cattle, giving the processors more power to set prices while ranchers struggled to make a living. Federal data show that for every dollar spent on food, the share that went to ranchers and...

A new 162,000-square-foot meat processing plant opened Oct. 21 in Camp Hill, Pa. The factory, off Lisburn Road, is owned by Ahold USA, which operates grocery store chains Giant, Martin’s and Stop & Shop, and is managed by Vantage Foods. The plant will cut and package beef and pork products for distribution to Giant’s stores in Pennsylvania, Maryland and surrounding states, said Tracey Pawelski, Ahold’s vice president of external communications. No animals will be slaughtered at the factory. The carcasses will be brought in from the company’s current suppliers, including Pennsylvania-based brands such as Hatfield and Berks as well as...

Workers at a Smithfield Foods pork plant in Milan, Missouri, say that for years they have endured repetitive stress injuries on the meat processing line — and urinary tract infections because they had so few bathroom breaks. But as the coronavirus pandemic has emerged, workers say they have encountered another health complication: reluctance to cover their mouths while coughing or to clean their faces after sneezing because this can cause them to miss a piece of meat as it goes by, creating a risk of disciplinary action. The claims appear in a complaint filed Thursday in federal court by an...