Media Statement; July 9, 2021
Contact: Tim Gibbons,
Missouri Rural Crisis Center,
(573) 449-1336,
timgibbons@morural.org
Columbia, MO—Today, Friday, July 9th, President Biden issued an Executive Order that takes action to reduce the trend of corporate consolidation, increase competition, and deliver concrete benefits to America’s consumers, workers, farmers, and small businesses.
For decades, Missouri Rural Crisis Center (MRCC), a statewide farm and rural membership organization representing the interests of independent family farms and rural communities, has been a leader calling for action to stop further corporatization and concentration within agriculture and our food system.
“MRCC commends President Biden and his Administration’s effort to level the playing field and increase fairness and competition within food, livestock and agricultural industries,” said Rhonda Perry, MRCC Executive Director and 5th generation Missouri livestock and grain farmer. “Corporate control of food production, processing and distribution has threatened our economies, national security, water and air, climate and democratic process. This has severely impacted our ability to have a safe and secure food system, endangered the livelihoods of independent family farmers and has extracted huge amounts of wealth from our rural communities.”
A family farm system is the solution.
Farm and food policies need to focus on farmers getting cost-of-production and a reasonable profit from the marketplace, while offering consumers family farm produced food at a fair price. This Administration and Congress must implement policies that: prioritize farm income from the sale of commodities at a fair price in open and competitive markets; strengthen and enforce antitrust laws and stop corporate concentration and vertical integration in the food industry; stop corporate factory farms from exploiting taxpayer-funded programs; ensure protection of farm and food industry workers from corporate exploitation; reinstate mandatory Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) for meat and poultry, and close all loopholes that allow for imported livestock and meat to be labeled as “product of the U.S.A.”
MRCC strongly supports this Executive Order and this action by the Biden Administration which takes the first necessary step towards an open, fair and competitive market in support of family farmers, rural communities, workers, consumers and our natural resources.
