White House accuses top US meat processors of ‘pandemic profiteering’

In  press briefing last week the Biden administration caused an uproar among the country’s top “big meat” producers, when it accused them of profiteering from the COVID-19 pandemic.

At the Sept. 8 briefing Department Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Tom Vilsack accompanied by National Economic Council Director Brian Deese made the claim while announcing the Biden-Harris administration’s plan to lower grocery store prices of meat products. 

During the briefing Deese referred to “pandemic profiteering” of large companies, as being one of the leading factors in increased grocery store prices. 

The ‘Big Meat’ business has four major companies Tyson Foods, Springdale, Arkansas; National Beef Packing, Co., Kansas City, Missouri;  Cargill Meat Solutions, Wayzata, Minnesota; and JBS Foods, Greeley, Colorado. 

Those four companies process over 80% of U.S.-produced beef, according to the USDA. 

Tyson says it owns a packing plant in North Platte that processes over 6,000 beef carcasses per day. 

In the briefing Deese claimed that the top four companies are reaching record high gross margins, without increasing the amount of money paid to the ranchers producing the live animals.

After the press briefing, Tyson released a statement claiming that increased prices are due to an oversupply of live cattle and a decrease in labor availability. 

“Multiple, unprecedented market shocks, including a global pandemic and severe weather conditions, led to an unexpected and drastic drop in meat processors’ abilities to operate at full capacity,” Tyson’s press release stated. “This led to an oversupply of live cattle and an undersupply of beef, while demand for beef products was at an all-time high. So, as a result, the price for cattle fell, while the price for beef rose. Today, prices paid to cattle producers are rising.”

In July, Vilsack announced a $500 million plan to help increase competition in the meat-packing industry. 

In that release Vilsack outlined a four step plan starting with an increase in regulations in the Packers and Stockyard Act. 

The second step is to increase the transparency of average pricing in the market. The third step is to increase price transparency in grocery stores. 

The final step is to increase the number of and processing capacity of small meat packing plants.