This document discusses the decline of family farms and rise of corporate agriculture in the United States. Over the last 30 years, the US has lost over 40% of its ranchers, 90% of its hog farmers, and 80% of its dairymen. Meanwhile, a small number of large corporations now dominate the food industry and control markets to their benefit and the detriment of family farms. The document advocates for more local and sustainable food systems that empower consumers and support small, independent producers.

1. The Politics and Economics of Food
Corporate or Family Farm
Global or Local
UCCS – Winter 2013
MikeCallicrate.com
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2. So this is where you grew up...
What happened Grandpa?
The U.S. has lost over 40% of it’s ranchers,
90% of it’s hog farmers and 80% of it’s
dairymen in the last 30 years.
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3. Photograph from the book, Great Ranches of the West ©2007 Jim Keen, All Rights Reserved
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Read a sample chapter and order the book at www.greatranchesofthewest.com – 800-363-5336

4. The National Security issue
no one is talking about!
Photograph from the book, Great Ranches of the West ©2007 Jim Keen, All Rights Reserved
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Read a sample chapter and order the book at www.greatranchesofthewest.com – 800-363-5336

5. Farm share of the consumer retail beef dollar
70.0%
1975
1950
65.0%
60.0%
55.0%
2012
1995 1996 1997 1999 2000
50.0%
1998
2006
45.0%
2009
40.0%
2002
35.0%
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
*All Fresh Choice Beef – USDA-ERS Data
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6. Barry Lynn's Cornered is...
"A manifesto for our time."
--Thomas Frank, Wall Street Journal
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7. Eric Schlosser, author of the best seller Fast
Food Nation, has an apt description of the
industry.
Over the last twenty years, about half a
million ranchers sold off their cattle and quit
the business. Many of the nation’s remaining
eight hundred thousand ranchers are fairing
poorly. They’re taking second jobs. They’re
selling cattle at break-even prices or at a loss.
The ranchers who are faring the worst run
three to four hundred head of cattle, manage
the ranch themselves, and live solely off the
proceeds… Ranchers currently face a host of
economic problems: rising land prices,
stagnant beef prices, oversupplies of cattle,
increased shipments of live cattle from Canada
and Mexico, development pressures.
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8. There is money in the food business…
Grocery Manufactures Association
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9. N7100C – Cargill
N199HF – Hormel Foods
N97SJ – J.M. Smucker
N1897S – J.M. Smucker
N135FT – Albertson’s
N46E – Hunt
N604CL – Hershey
N654CM – Crossmark Corp.
N457H – Bank of America
N606RP – Nestle Purina Pet Care Co.
N102CX – Clorox
N545CS – Wells Fargo
N604MU – Dean Mfg. Group
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10. Meanwhile, back on the farm… Old Calnon place, So. of St. Francis
Winter day on Webster St.
Trucks in St. Francis, KS
Sept. 6, 2009
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11. America: Becoming a Land Without Farmers
Evaggelos Vallianatos, September 10, 2012
“The plutocratic remaking of America has a parallel in
the countryside. In rural America less than 3 percent
of farmers make more than 63 percent of the money,
including government subsidies.
“The results of this emerging feudal economy are
everywhere. Large areas of the United States are
becoming impoverished farm towns with abandoned
farmhouses and deserted land. More and more of the
countryside has been devoted to massive factory
farms and plantations.”
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12. “You should be suing
Walmart [instead of
IBP], they are the
problem. They tell us
what they will pay and
we have no choice but
to pay you less.”
- John Tyson, 2002
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13. Emptiness: A picture of big meat packer
retaliation – Why cattle feeders won’t speak out
against meat packer abuses…
Callicrate Cattle Co., 1999 13

14. “These guys [Tyson] are nothing but
old-time gangsters, thugs and
thieves. They beat your brains in
with their market power and take
your money.”
January 12, 2004, Montgomery, AL
-Associated Press quoting Mike Callicrate on opening day of IBP/Tyson trial
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15. Average return on equity before tax (ROE)
Retail grocery: ROE = 21% (last 6 years)
Meat packing: ROE = 17% (last 6 years)
All Farming & ranching: ROE = NEGATIVE 0.54%
(last 13 years)
Packers--for those with sales > $500k - Before tax ROE, 2002-2009: 17.38% - source: http://www.bizminer.com/industries/Meat-
packing-plants-2011/
Retail grocery--food marketing institute book - http://www.fmi.org - 2003-2009 average: before tax ROE = 20.75%
Cattle--for the farm typology "cattle" meaning primarily cattle operations in USDA/ERS annual surveys -
http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/ARMS/
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16. Eaters
BIG FOOD
Farmers and Ranchers
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18. BIG FOOD
A dark place
A lawless place
A place where money and power come before people
and freedom
Where kickbacks and predatory pricing are standard
practice
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19. Where family farms and ranches are bankrupted
by unfair, manipulated and rigged markets
It is a place where farmers become indentured
servants and serfs, signing short term contracts
with dishonest processors with a lifetime
mortgage that will likely never be paid
Where workers, animals, and the earth are
abused and exploited
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20. It is where Pink Slime is considered "beef“
Big Food makes money making us sick and leaves us
with the bill
Where growth enhancing compounds are illegal in
the sports, but legal in the meat we eat
Where food is taken from the hungriest people and
the poorest places on earth to sell to those with the
most money
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21. It's a place where the biggest cheaters win
Big food controls government agencies and has
captured our universities that our tax dollars
support
Today's Big Food industrial food system is a full
return to Upton Sinclair's Jungle
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22. THE RANCH FOODS DIRECT SOLUTION
Eaters
BIG FOOD
Farmers and Ranchers 22

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24. Their grazing helps our dehydrating
planet retain moisture in the earth,
contributing to global water supplies.
Vandana Shiva – Winner of Monsanto’s “Bullshit” award
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25. “Our cow dung is worth more
than your Wall Street stocks.”
-Vandana Shiva speaking to Hillary Clinton in India
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26. A better , more direct route for producers ,and consumers wanting
to know where their food comes from…
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27. Refrigerated trailer transports carcasses
from mobile unit to cut plant
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28. Carcasses from mobile unit are cut into
primals and boxed or hung for dry aging
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30. Putting the family farm face
on industrial agribusiness
“We are the farmers and ranchers of America.”
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31. Cargill, Safeway Go Locavore in Colorado
September 13, 2012 - FORT MORGAN, Colo.—Cargill
and Safeway have announced a collaboration that
will bring “Colorado Proud” beef products to Safeway
stores throughout Colorado as part of the retailer’s
Rancher’s Reserve Tender Beef line.
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32. Tyson launches unique new audit
program for on-farm animal treatment
10/12/12 - Tyson Foods, Inc. has launched a
company-wide auditing program to monitor the
treatment of animals by the 12,000 livestock and
poultry farmers that supply the company.
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33. Proposed Colorado Springs Public Market - Creating
a new community space for eaters, growers, family
farmers, ranchers and local businesses, separate
and safe from Big Food and Wall Street.
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34. We cannot separate what we
believe from how we act in the
marketplace and the broader community,
for this is where we make our primary
contribution to the pursuit of economic
justice.
- U.S. Bishops 1986
What we support prospers,
what we feed grows!
More info at www.MikeCallicrate.com
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