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1. Monopoly power in the peanut industry has pushed thousands of small farmers to the brink of bankruptcy. It has also made peanuts more expensive to taxpayers than any other crop in the country. New from me in @CivilEats https://civileats.com/2021/01/15/op-ed-the-peanut-industry-has-a-monopoly-problem-but-farmers-are-pushing-back/
2. I've written a lot about the industry already, but the story goes: Two big shelling companies - that clean, dry and de-shell peanuts - buy 80% of all peanuts grown in America. https://twitter.com/ronmknox/status/1334546570726019074?lang=en
3. There's no futures market or cash prices for peanuts, so there's no transparency in what farmers get for their crops. The two monopoly shellers decide what price they want to pay, and that's that. https://civileats.com/2021/01/15/op-ed-the-peanut-industry-has-a-monopoly-problem-but-farmers-are-pushing-back/
4. A group of farmers sued the big shellers last year, claiming that concentration in the industry allowed the shelling companies to conspire to fix prices and rig the system.
https://www.locklaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Peanut-Farmer-Antitrust-Complaint.pdf
https://www.locklaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Peanut-Farmer-Antitrust-Complaint.pdf
5. What's new in my story is the cost to taxpayers, who pay peanut farmers the difference between the low, uncompetitive price the monopolies decide to pay, and a minimum price set out in the farm bill intended to help farmers cover production costs.
It's a lot.
It's a lot.
6. In part because of monopoly pricing in the industry, peanuts are the most expensive per-acre crop to taxpayers in the country. You and I have paid peanut farmers more than $2 BILLION from 2014-2018. https://civileats.com/2021/01/15/op-ed-the-peanut-industry-has-a-monopoly-problem-but-farmers-are-pushing-back/
7. The good news is that farmers are working together to break the shellers' power. New farmer-owned cooperatives are forming around the peanut belt, including one in Georgia that opened the largest shelling facility on earth.
8. Industry observers say there's never been an agricultural deconcentration project like the one happening in peanuts today. The head of the national peanut board told me he thought farmer-owned co-ops could control a quarter of the shelling market in the coming years.
9. Ideally we'd have strong federal antitrust enforcement to prevent the many mergers and acquisitions that created the shelling monopoly in the first place.
But regular folks can fight back against monopoly. Peanuts can help show the way. /end https://civileats.com/2021/01/15/op-ed-the-peanut-industry-has-a-monopoly-problem-but-farmers-are-pushing-back/
But regular folks can fight back against monopoly. Peanuts can help show the way. /end https://civileats.com/2021/01/15/op-ed-the-peanut-industry-has-a-monopoly-problem-but-farmers-are-pushing-back/
