Mike Brown, president of the National Chicken Council (NCC), recently provided testimony to the House Agriculture Committee on how chicken is a vital food source for many Americans but may soon be hard to access due to overly burdensome regulations facing the chicken industry.
“The chicken industry is a model of American innovation and efficiency,” Brown said at the Feb. 28 hearing titled "Uncertainty, Inflation, Regulations: Challenges for American Agriculture.” “In fact, there is no more important food source in America. Chicken is healthy, sustainable and affordable. Chicken supports millions of jobs and thousands of rural communities. Chicken provides nourishing, affordable protein for Americans. But overzealous and misguided regulations threaten to take chicken off the plate for millions.”
Brown explained how the regulations would have a more negative impact on certain individuals.
“And those most vulnerable would be first in line: Lower income earners, children who receive free and reduced cost school meals and needy individuals who rely on food banks to feed their families,” Brown said at the hearing. “With soaring across-the-board inflation, the looming threat of recession and geopolitical disruption, there has never been a worse time for needless governmental regulation.”
In his testimony, Brown talked about several pieces of legislation that he sees as exceptionally burdensome for the chicken industry, including the Packers and Stockyards Act and new Salmonella regulations.
“All of these regulatory programs share two things in common: One, there is no compelling justification for them, and two, they would drive unprecedented levels of food inflation and food scarcity,” Brown said.
The Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921 was implemented in an attempt to discourage anti-competitive practices in the meat and poultry markets, according to the National Agricultural Law Center.
In October, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) proposed new guidelines to reduce Salmonella contamination in poultry products, according to a release. The new guidelines would require all poultry to undergo Salmonella testing before entering facilities and would add additional process control monitoring.
With regard to food inflation, from January to December 2022, the price of whole chickens increased by 13% while the price of eggs increased by 120%, according to the St. Louis Fed.
Comfy Living reports Americans consume approximately 8 billion chickens every year.
Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson said in his closing remarks during the hearing that the witnesses provided valuable insight on the challenges that the agriculture industry is facing, according to a House Agriculture Committee press release. Thompson said that issues such as market volatility and misguided government policies need to be examined by the committee and addressed in its upcoming farm bill.
“Getting the farm bill done right and on time will require a lot of work and attention from all of us, but we owe it to all our constituents—from producers to processors, and ultimately, to consumers—to get that policy right,” Thompson said at the hearing.
Thompson noted that the committee will hold multiple additional hearings and listening sessions to gather input for the farm bill.
