new player in the pork game

[jodywy]

http://www.myfoxny.com/story/22444702/shuanghui-buying-smithfield-foods-for-about-472b

 

[andybob]

I agree with the comments that this is a good time to look to buying locally and boycotting Smithfields - the Chinese probably intend exporting as much of the Smithfield production back to China anyway! The production on the Murphy farms has long been inefficient with adherence to the manual overriding efficient production by any other means.

 

[SD18]

I agree. There are a lot of local farms that should be supported before buying form companies headquertered overseas. Whenever i can, i do buy from the local farmers, before going to the grocery store.

 

[knabe]

break up the monopoly the usda has over inspections.

logistically i don't know how to do that and still comply with an inspection infrastructure.

 

[Whitewing]

These Chinese investments in the US remind me of the Japanese investments of a couple of decades ago, though I suspect the Chinese have a lot more staying power than the japs ever did.

And while I agree that it's always wise to help out local producers, is avoiding a "foreign-owned" company's products not like buying a Dodge (made in Mexico) versus a Toyota (made in America) because the Dodge is an American brand?

 

[redrobin]

break up the monopoly the usda has over inspections.

logistically i don't know how to do that and still comply with an inspection infrastructure.

Hello my brother.

 

[nortexsook]

break up the monopoly the usda has over inspections.

logistically i don't know how to do that and still comply with an inspection infrastructure.

Hello my brother.

I talk about this a lot. America has become a "corporatacracy". And it comes with Kabuki Theater.

Big companies are the ones who benefit from all the ridiculous regulations and rules by all the assorted government bureaucracy. They feign resistance but know ultimately it actually builds a huge mote around their business and stifles any legitimate competition from small or new companies.

We lose our country a little more everyday.

 

[Whitewing]

break up the monopoly the usda has over inspections.

logistically i don't know how to do that and still comply with an inspection infrastructure.

Hello my brother.

I talk about this a lot. America has become a "corporatacracy". And it comes with Kabuki Theater.

Big companies are the ones who benefit from all the ridiculous regulations and rules by all the assorted government bureaucracy. They feign resistance but know ultimately it actually builds a huge mote around their business and stifles any legitimate competition from small or new companies.

We lose our country a little more everyday.

I read an article just the other day on this subject. The author called it the "fourth branch of government".

He describes in details the myriad rules and regulations that are forced upon the American public without having go through Congressional approval and with little oversight as well.

I'll try find that article and post it here for those interested in the subject.

 

[Whitewing]

This actually isn't the article I was looking for but still gives you some ideas of the recent explosion of new rules and regulations.

America's economic and political infrastructure is awash in a flood of federal regulations that is growing deeper and more expensive every day. Consider these data points from the Competitive Enterprise Institute's latest edition of its annual "Ten Thousand Commandments" report:

* In the two decades CEI has published Ten Thousand Commandments, 81,883 final rules have been issued. That's more than 3,500 per year or about nine per day.

* The Anti-Democracy Index -- the ratio of regulations issued to laws passed by Congress and signed by the president -- stood at 29 to 1 in 2012. That's 127 new laws and 3,708 new rules -- or a new rule every two-and-a-half hours.

* Some 63 departments, agencies and commissions currently have new regulations awaiting approval.

* The 2012 Federal Register had 78,961 pages. That's fourth highest all time. The top two all-time are 81,405 pages in 2010 and 81,247 pages in 2011.

* The EPA added 223 rules in 2012 -- sixth among federal agencies behind Treasury, Commerce, Interior, Agriculture and Transportation. But its overall total of 1,953 rules account for 48 percent of all federal rules, and their compliance cost -- $353 billion -- far exceeds that of all other agencies.

* Total annual costs for Americans to comply with federal regulations reached $1.806 trillion in 2012. For the first time, this amounts to more than half of total annual federal spending. It is more than the GDPs of Canada and Mexico.

* Regulatory costs amount to $14,678 per family -- 23 percent of the average household income of $63,685 and more than receipts from corporate and personal income taxes combined.

* Per-employee regulatory costs climbed from $7,755 for firms with 500 or more employees to $10,585 for those with fewer than 20.

* Combined with $3.53 trillion in federal spending, Washington's share of the economy now reaches 34.4 percent.

* Tax compliance accounts for one-sixth the total cost of regulation -- more than $300 billion.

Washington politicians and bureaucrats seem to have forgotten that one of the key charges against King George III in the Declaration of Independence was that he had "erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance."

But it was not primarily the heavy economic cost of the King's multitudes and swarms that so worried the founders as much as the unaccountability that resulted. As Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration, put it a few years before his death: "Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure."

In other words, it is all but impossible to have a government of laws, not of men, when the law is made up of thousands upon thousands of directives, including many so densely worded that understanding them requires the services of highly paid specialists who concentrate on one or two areas of regulation. Sooner or later, the profusion of regulations will drown out the essential liberties enshrined in the Constitution.

 

[nortexsook]

Good Stuff, Whitewing.....

 

[Anonymous]

(Reuters) - With Washington state about to embark on a first-of-its-kind legal market for recreational marijuana, the budding ranks of new cannabis growers face a quandary over what to do with the excess stems, roots and leaves from their plants.

Susannah Gross, who owns a five-acre farm north of Seattle, is part of a group experimenting with a solution that seems to make the most of marijuana's appetite-enhancing properties - turning weed waste into pig food.

Four pigs whose feed was supplemented with potent plant leavings during the last four months of their lives ended up 20 to 30 pounds heavier than the half-dozen other pigs from the same litter when they were all sent to slaughter in March.

"They were eating more, as you can imagine," Gross said.

Giving farm animals the munchies is the latest outcome of a ballot measure passed by Washington voters in November making their state one of the first to legalize the recreational use of pot. The other was Colorado. Both were among about 20 states with medical marijuana laws already on their books.

The federal government still classifies cannabis as an illegal narcotic, and the Obama administration has not yet said what actions, if any, it will take in answer to the newly passed recreational weed statutes.

Matt McAlman, the medical marijuana grower who provided the pot leavings for Gross' pigs, says he hopes the idea expands with the likely impending expansion of Washington state's marijuana industry.

"We can have pot chickens, pot pigs, grass-fed beef," he said.

Draft regulations issued last week to govern the burgeoning recreational-use industry seem to leave open that possibility. The rules dictate that marijuana plant waste must be "rendered unusable prior to leaving a licensed producer or processor's facility," adding that mixing it with food waste would be acceptable.

Gross' pigs were butchered by William von Schneidau, who has a shop at the famous Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle. In March, von Schneidau held a "Pot Pig Gig" at the market, serving up the marijuana-fed pork as part of a five-course meal.

He quickly sold out the remaining weed-fed meat at his shop but plans another pot-pig feast later this summer, he said.

"Some say the meat seems to taste more savory," he said.

The results beg the question of whether pot-fed pork contains any measurable traces of THC, the mind-altering chemical ingredient in cannabis.

The European Food Safety Authority reported in 2011 that "no studies concerning tolerance or effects of graded levels of THC in food-producing animals have been found in literature."

The agency also noted that "no data are available concerning the likely transfer of THC ... to animal tissues and eggs following repeated administration."

Does Smithfield have any plants in Washington :???: ...Maybe the Chinese are looking for "pot" roasts.... :wink:

 

[andybob]

These Chinese investments in the US remind me of the Japanese investments of a couple of decades ago, though I suspect the Chinese have a lot more staying power than the japs ever did.

And while I agree that it's always wise to help out local producers, is avoiding a "foreign-owned" company's products not like buying a Dodge (made in Mexico) versus a Toyota (made in America) because the Dodge is an American brand?

Protecting local jobs and keeping the money in the local economy is certainly a more important consideration than supporting a foreign based "American" brand. The problem with Smithfields is that they have traditionally used a majority of cheap imported labour rathet than local citizens, until the FBI stepped up security checks a very large percentage of the workers were illegal Mexicans both in the Tarheel NC plant and the farms. The management positions are being filled from South Americans who are actively recruited at their universities. As few jobs are truly local, and money is being sent back to their country of origin and not spent locally so not benefitting the local economy. The Chinese might intend bringing in their own people to replace the South American workers, as they have done throughout Africa.

 

[3 M L & C]

These Chinese investments in the US remind me of the Japanese investments of a couple of decades ago, though I suspect the Chinese have a lot more staying power than the japs ever did.

And while I agree that it's always wise to help out local producers, is avoiding a "foreign-owned" company's products not like buying a Dodge (made in Mexico) versus a Toyota (made in America) because the Dodge is an American brand?

Protecting local jobs and keeping the money in the local economy is certainly a more important consideration than supporting a foreign based "American" brand. The problem with Smithfields is that they have traditionally used a majority of cheap imported labour rathet than local citizens, until the FBI stepped up security checks a very large percentage of the workers were illegal Mexicans both in the Tarheel NC plant and the farms. The management positions are being filled from South Americans who are actively recruited at their universities. As few jobs are truly local, and money is being sent back to their country of origin and not spent locally so not benefitting the local economy. The Chinese might intend bringing in their own people to replace the South American workers, as they have done throughout Africa.

There is a reason that more American citizens don't work in packing plants and other places like that and immigrants do. Most Americans won't work a job like that.