Pork industry underscores need for expanded markets, education w/ Missouri pork production info

By Derek Spellman

dspellman@joplinglobe.com

GOLDEN CITY, Mo. — Missouri’s pork industry wants to expand into international markets to boost prices, while at the same time its members are working to sell their neighbors and communities on the industry’s economic impact back home.

Industry officials also are asking for federal stimulus money to compensate for losses, but some of their critics are saying federal money has been making matters worse for the farmers.

Hog producers and others met last week in Golden City, and said Congress needs to take up trade agreements that would open up countries such as Colombia and South Korea to U.S. pork exports. The meeting was part of the Missouri Agriculture Lunch & Learn Series conducted by groups emphasizing the importance of agriculture in local communities.

The hog industry is facing environmental and other challenges from groups that want regulators and federal agencies to clamp down.

A group of organizations collectively calling themselves the Campaign for Family Farms and the Environment recently presented a petition to Tom Vilsack, U.S. agriculture secretary, asking for a suspension of federal loans for creating new hog and poultry operations in the country or expanding existing ones. They are arguing that the hog industry already suffers from overproduction.

In response, officials with the Missouri Pork Association want to underscore the pork industry’s ties to local communities — especially economic ties.

“If you don’t have a strong agriculture, you don’t have a Golden City, you don’t have a Lamar, you don’t have a lot of cities (in Missouri),” said Don Nikodim, executive vice president and chief executive officer of the Missouri Pork Association, speaking in Golden City. “(Agriculture) is the No. 1 business in the state of Missouri.”

Going whole hog

The state ranks seventh in the country in pork production, Nikodim said, with a total economic impact of $1.1 billion in Missouri providing about 32,000 direct and supporting jobs.

In Barton County alone, for example, the hog operation run by Synergy LLC has an annual economic impact of more than $9.9 million, according to Francis Forst, the Missouri operations manager for Synergy and chairman of the government and public policy committee for the Missouri Pork Association.

“That money is spent here,” Forst said.

More than 46 percent of that money is used to buy feed, he said. The total also includes labor, taxes and utilities paid, and propane.

And while opponents want the U.S. Department of Agriculture to tighten federal loans, livestock growers are asking for more federal help.