Take Action Now Against Unjust Poultry Industry Practices

Unjust Poultry Industry Practices

Tell the DOJ and USDA to protect family farmers and put a stop to the abusive practices of big poultry companies.

Take Action to save family poultry farmers! On May 21, the Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Agriculture held a workshop to investigate the abusive state of contract poultry farming in the United States. But the DOJ and USDA had a hard time finding farmers who were willing to speak out about the problems they're facing. Why? Farmers are scared of retaliation from the big poultry companies, and for good reason.

We’ve heard the stories about what happens when a farmer speaks up about the unfair, one-sided and abusive contracts:

Poultry companies provide poor quality feed or sick chicks that die within days
Poultry companies halt or delay the delivery of new birds
Farmers are required to make expensive farm upgrades without fair compensation
Farmers' contracts are dropped without warning

Tell the DOJ and USDA to protect family farmers and put a stop to the abusive practices of big poultry companies.

Fill out the form below to take action now and send a letter about current poultry practices. Feel free to add your own comments in the bottom box.

Take Action

Message Recipients

US Dept of Justice Agriculture

Review the Message

Subject:*

Dear (recipient name),

The Honorable Eric Holder
Attorney General	
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC  20530

The Honorable Tom Vilsack			
Secretary 				
U.S. Department of Agriculture
1400 Independence Avenue, SW
Washington, DC  20250

The poultry sector is in a ruinous state.  Under the current one-sided and abusive system of contract production, family farmers who raise poultry are left with no control over their practices and operations, and forced to abide by deceptive and unfair contracts designed to serve the poultry companies alone.  Poultry growers who try to organize or speak out against this imbalance in power, and those who simply attempt to negotiate the terms of their contract, have faced severe retaliation that puts their livelihoods and financial future at risk.  

Congress long ago gave the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Justice the authority to prohibit this abuse and to take action against companies that use such practices, yet this authority has not been adequately enforced. The DOJ/USDA joint workshop to investigate corporate concentration and anti-trust abuses in the poultry industry is a necessary step in addressing the egregious and long-ignored abuses that have come to typify our nation’s poultry sector. But your action must not stop there. Here’s what USDA and DOJ must do now to address this extreme imbalance in power in the poultry sector:

- Take aggressive action to enforce the law against unfair and deceptive trade practices by poultry companies.  

- Prohibit poultry companies from requiring their growers to install expensive company-mandated upgrades in their poultry houses at their own expense and without compensation.  Growers are often put in a position either to pay for the expensive company-mandated upgrades to their chicken houses or lose their contract altogether and face bankruptcy. This practice is nothing short of extortion, and must be stopped.

- Acknowledge that the current system of payment for poultry growers is unfair and deceptive, and prohibit its use.  The current payment system gives these companies free rein to manipulate grower’s payments based on factors the growers can’t control.  If the company supplies the growers with bad chicks or bad feed, the grower is forced to pay for the companies’ errors.  This system only exists because of extreme power enjoyed by the poultry companies and the growers’ valid fear of retaliation if they speak out.     

- Investigate how anti-competitive practices and concentration in the poultry sector have resulted in cuts in payment to poultry growers over the past two decades.  

Our country needs a fair and competitive market where poultry companies can no longer force abusive contracts on family farmers.  It's up to you to help us achieve reforms that will benefit growers, companies, and consumers.

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