NPPC Calls For Renewal Of Mandatory Price Reporting

Jun 10, 2015

The National Pork Producers Council is urging the U.S. Senate to take action, before the August recess, to pass an improved version of the act that makes mandatory the reporting by American packers of livestock purchases and prices.

Under the livestock reporting act of 1999, that took effect in 2001, purchasers of hogs, cattle and sheep are required to report to the U.S. Department of Agriculture purchases made and prices paid.

The act, which is designed to reflect what's happening in the industry and bring fairness to the market, must be reauthorized every five years.

National Pork Producers Council CEO Neil Dierks says allowing the law to expire would be highly disruptive.

Neil Dierks-National Pork Producers Council:

The process right now, it is a bill that has three improvements for the pork industry side, has passed the U.S. House Committee on Agriculture and we would expect in the near future that our House of Representatives will approve by the full house.

It's really a non controversial bill.

We've been talking to the industry for over two years on the improvements, the buyers, the sellers, but anyway the whole idea is how do we improve things.

On the U.S. Senate side there was a briefing done of some staff during May.

There's no specific date set for a hearing but we hope the Ag Committee in the Senate will take action on it and we hope the whole thing will be renewed by the August recess.

Source : Farmscape

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.