Coalition to host townhall in advance of agriculture antitrust hearing

Farmers and consumers, who are not anticipated to play a major role in the Justice Department’s upcoming agriculture antitrust roundtable in Ankeny, are still intent on having their voice heard.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will be one of the speakers at the DOJ/USDA antitrust workshop March 12 in Ankeny (Photo: usda.gov).

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of Justice have jointly scheduled a series of workshops for dialogue on the issues and concerns facing agriculture. The first of those meetings is scheduled for March 12 in Ankeny, and will reportedly focus on competition in the seed industry as well as serve as an introduction to the entire series of meetings.

As Bill Bishop of The Daily Yonder notes, despite the DOJ’s calls for input from farmers and ranchers, only one out of more than 20 scheduled speakers at the Ankeny event is a person who makes his living on the land. There is a brief period at the end of the discussions that has been set aside for comments from those remaining in the audience.

In response, a coalition of local, state and national community, consumer, farmer and labor organizations are holding their own townhall meeting on Thursday, March 11, at the Best Western Hotel in Ankeny.

“The corporate control of our food system by multinationals like Cargill, Monsanto and Wal-Mart is devastating to consumers, farmers, workers and the environment,” said Barb Kalbach, a fourth-generation family farmer from Dexter and member of one of the coalition groups, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement.

The groups coming together believe that decades of bad farm policy and unchecked corporate mergers have driven independent family farmers out of business and created powerful corporate factory farms and agribusiness giants that dominate the market. Current statistics such as 85 percent of all U.S. beef being slaughtered by four companies, half of all U.S. corn seed being controlled by two companies and 40 percent of the nation’s fluid milk supply being in the hands of one company appear to support the coalition’s concerns.

“After years of ignoring the corporate concentration and lack of competition in our food system, the DOJ and the USDA are finally admitting that there might be a problem,” said Dave Murphy of Clear Lake and affiliated with Food Democracy Now. “Unfortunately, family farmers, consumer advocates, and organized labor are underrepresented on the panels at the DOJ/USDA anti-trust workshop. This grassroots townhall meeting is essential to ensure that the voices of people most affected by this problem are heard loud and clear.”

The event is free, but tickets will be issued due to limited seating. Registration can be completed by either phoning (515) 282-0484 or sending an e-mail message to david@iowacci.org. It is being hosted by Iowa CCI, Food and Water Watch, the National Family Farms Coalition and Food Democracy Now.

“The grassroots have the solutions,” Kalbach said. “It’s time to bust up big ag, pass policies that promote sustainable agriculture and local markets, and put people before profits and polluters.”