House Ag Looks To Introduce Cattle Contract Library Act

The House Agriculture Committee will advance several bills Thursday, including one supporters says will boost cattle contract transparency. The bipartisan, industry-backed Cattle Contract Library Act is expected to boost contract transparency and producer leverage in negotiating with packers, a top concern in the highly concentrated industry.

“The Agricultural Marketing Service maintains a library of the various contracts and pricing arrangements in the swine industry," said Georgia Republican Representative Rick Allen. "However, no such contract library exists for cattle producers. I have heard from several cattlemen about the need to provide more transparency in the market, particularly for formula transactions.”

“The president’s executive order has asked us to put together a report due in December, on this very issue," Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack recently said. "I don’t want to anticipate and expect what the report’s ultimately going to conclude, but I think, to the extent that we can create more information for producers, about what contracts ought to be, what contract are, the more transparency, I think the stronger the market is.”

The House Ag Committee is also considering bills for rural development, scholarship funding at 1890s institutions, chronic wasting disease research, forest restoration and wildfire assessments, and carbon sequestration grants.

Click Here to learn more about the Cattle Contract Library Act.

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