USDA’s Economic Research Service recently released a report titled U.S. Hog Production: Rising Output and Changing Trends in Productivity Growth. We congratulate Madison McVan and the Arkansas Advocate for drawing attention to the changes in the hog production industry over the last decades. McVan’s summary offers remaining family farm hog producers a rare opportunity to understand who their competition is and how USDA is failing producers, consumers, and taxpayers.
As a follow-up, we encourage readers to consider the “Opinion” My Rural America published on 11/29/2022: “Has USDA learned any lessons from the ERS hog industry study? We think NOT!”
In summary, USDA did not factor in what the real costs of the hog industry becoming more concentrated, resulting in profits being redirected from farm country to the big corporates. USDA’s report declares over and over again how the industry’s concentration has made hog production cheaper, but saying it’s so, doesn’t make it so.