Tuesday, September 27th 2016
USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack last week defended his agency’s proposed Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) rule at a Senate Agriculture Committee hearing on the state of the farm economy. The so-called GIPSA Rule was proposed in 2010 to implement provisions related to the buying and selling of livestock and poultry included in the 2008 Farm Bill. But the proposed rule went well beyond the Farm Bill mandates and would have had a significant negative effect on the livestock industry. While the new rule – expected to be issued in the coming weeks – has yet to be made public, the 2010 one would have cost the U.S. pork industry more than $330 million annually, according to a November 2010 Informa Economics study.