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December 16, 2009

Pork problems endure

Many events are concerning to hog farmers

By Tim Krohn

MANKATO — If hog farmers don’t have enough worry with low prices, here are a few more things to think about:

More aggressive and successful anti-livestock activists, rising feed prices because of more ethanol production, greenhouse legislation that will hike production costs, food inflation and the continued fallout from the H1N1/swine flu public relations problem.

The bearer of the news challenging the pork industry was delivered by Neil Dierks, chief executive of the National Pork Producers Council, speaking Wednesday at the annual Minnesota Pork Producers meeting in Mankato.

He said financial damage from unfounded fears that eating pork could spread the flu is easing, but hog producers still have been losing about $20 a head for many months. “Revenue damage will pass $1.5 billion from the H1N1 issue,” Dierks said.

He warned a growing threat is coming from activists. Ohio recently passed a constitutional amendment setting up an animal care regulatory board. Dierks said such endeavors may be reasonable at the start, but the regulatory boards often become dominated by anti-farming activists.

He pointed to Michigan as an example of the increased power of animal welfare groups. After Humane Society threats of a statewide animal-rights referendum, lawmakers passed a bill that will phase out gestation stalls in hog barns, raising costs for farmers.

“There will be more of this,” Dierks said. “As more people become farther removed from farms, there are more calls for (stricter regulations),” he said.

Hog farmers also have some tension with their corn-raising neighbors. Increased corn-ethanol production has driven up the price of corn and also hog feed. That’s why the pork industry is pushing to sunset tax credits going to ethanol production.

And Dierks said the federal government has moved away from policies that foster cheap food, a course he predicts will bring big spikes in food costs that unfairly will be blamed on farmers.

“I think there’s going to be a food shock in this nation. I’m gray enough to remember in the ’70s the protests in grocery stores because meat prices were too high,” Dierks said.

Pending legislation over greenhouse gas emissions could have significant impacts on farming, Dierks said.

One of the biggest worries is that “cap and trade” policies will make it more lucrative for farmers to convert millions of acres of crop land into trees and grasses to capture carbon.

That, he said, would significantly drive up grain and feed prices.

Dennis Potter, a Springfield farmer attending the meeting with his son, Nate, said their 2,000-head-a-year hog operation has been hit hard the past year or more.

“We’re struggling to make a profit like everyone else.

“I think the future will pick up, but it’s going to be slow,” Potter said.

After dropping hard, exports of American pork have begun to pick up. Major markets — including Mexico, China, Japan and Russia — cut exports because of H1N1 flu fears and for protectionist reasons.

China, Dierks said, is opening markets some but is slow in doing so as it aims to increase its own hog production with the help of $21 billion in government subsidies.

“That’s of some concern to us.”

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