Pork industry giant Smithfield Foods may be shuttering 37 of their sow farms in northern Missouri this month.
The developing news was released recently by KTVO-TV, who say they received a message from an unnamed Smithfield employee stating that the company announced that they’d be shuttering sow farms in Putnam and Mercer Counties.
When KTVO reached out to Smithfield for a statement, Vice President for Corporate Affairs Jim Monroe told them, “We are always taking steps to enhance our business for consistently strong performance through favorable and unfavorable market conditions.”
However, the employee speaking anonymously stated that challenging hog markets might be more likely to blame.
Hog-raising costs, much like most of the agriculture sector, remain elevated. According to the Pork Checkoff, pork prices have been experiencing softer consumer demand with lean hog prices anticipated to be slightly up in May and June, but drop again year-over-year in July and August. Pork cut prices, aside from picnics, have also been down all year.
Smithfield reportedly owns 132 farms with 109 contract farms in Missouri, a leased farm, eight feed mills, and a pork processing plant.
For Smithfield, controversies and closures are nothing new
This isn’t the first facility shuttered by Smithfield. Their Vernon, California, facility was slated to close in early 2023 due to the rising cost of operating a business in the state.
In July 2021, the company closed its founding slaughter plant in Smithfield, Virginia.
In addition to plant closures, Smithfield Foods has faced a fair amount of scrutiny after the Chinese firm WH Group purchased the company in 2013. The purchase made the WH Group the largest pork producer in the United States, with over 146,000 acres of foreign-owned farmland in their possession across the U.S.
In Missouri alone, CSIS reports that 42,000 acres were in Missouri. While Missouri had banned foreign-owned land in the state, a rule change allowed Smithfield’s purchase, but current legislation across the country might affect foreign-owned plants or at least, further acquisitions such as those made by WH Group of Smithfield.
Smithfield agreed last summer to pay a $42 million settlement addressing allegations over pork price-fixing. The lawsuit accused the company of inflating pork prices by limiting hog supplies and inflating pork prices over more than 20 years.
Smithfield Foods has settled in a previous suit for $83 million, admitting no wrongdoing, although they are accused of using private information from reports to allegedly control supply and pricing.
»Related: Missouri Senate gives thumbs up to bill limiting foreign land ownership
