Behind the Scenes

Politics of livestock pricing

The politics of price reporting have come full circle on Thursday, as leaders on Capitol Hill are battling in the final hours of a federal act that requires meat packers to make public the prices they pay livestock producers. The Mandatory Price Reporting Act is set to expire on Friday — unless legislator come to a compromise and pass an extension.

But as of right now that’s not going to happen. The Senate Agriculture Committee is trying to "hotline" a House-back extension of five years. But the move to voice-vote the measure in the Senate cannot face any opposition, lest it will die. And opposition it is getting from both the Harkin and Grassley offices. The two Iowa Senators introduced their own version of an extension. There’s is only one year long. It also allows room for a GAO report due out next month to change things if need be.

The Iowans want the House to compromise. The rest of the Senate want to extend the plan. Time is running out. And livestock groups are desperate for action. A Grassley staffer told me this evening that they’d compromise if the House version were amended to include the provision that things could change once the GAO report is released. But a Farm Bureau lobbyist speculated today that the GAO’s data won’t likely amount to a hill of beans.

Stay tuned. We’ll see what happens in the next 24 hours.