From Berkeley to Boston: Coming Together Around Freedom, Fairness and Food

By Mike Callicrate & Fred Stokes Eating is one thing we all have in common. And, to millions of us, what we eat, how it’s produced, and where it comes from is important. OCM has worked for the last fourteen years to restore competition in the agricultural marketplace. We believe family farmers and ranchers make the best stewards of our land and livestock, and are the most reliable and trustworthy…
Read more...Tags:Beef Checkoff , big food , big packers , chickenization , Coalition for a Prosperous America , Fred Stokes , GIPSA , HSUS , Humane Society of the United States , IBP , John Dittrich , Mike Callicrate , Mississippi Farm Bureau , National Cattlemen's Beef Association , NCBA , Polsinelli Shughart , The Beef Checkoff Reform Taskforce , U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance , USDA , USFRA
The HSUS Works for Animals and Family Farmers

Our adversaries in industrialized agriculture want to frame the animal protection debate in static, black-and-white terms. They want to position all animal advocates as opponents of farming. They want to be judge and jury when it comes to best practices. They pillory animal advocates, and increasingly all consumers and even food retailers, as unfamiliar with the basics, and even the harsh realities, of agriculture. That’s their fictional representation, just like…
Read more...Tags:Alan Guebert , Colorado , Factory farming , Fred Stokes , HSUS , Humane Society of the United States , meat science , Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation , National Pork Producers Council , NCBA , Nebraska , new agriculture , OCM
Canada’s Beef Industry Now Foreign Owned

For Immediate Release October 19, 2012 Mad Cow, E. coli and abusive market power broker the deal The world witnessed as Cargill and Tyson plundered the Canadian cattle and beef industries after the 2003 Mad Cow debacle. By 2008, there was little meat left on the industries’ bones, so Tyson sold to Nilsson Brothers Inc., an Alberta based cattle dealer, auction house operator, and owner of a 10,000 head per…
Read more...Tags:Canada , Cargill , Foreign , Fred Stokes , JBS , Mad Co , Nilsson Brothers Inc , Sheri Monk , South America , Tyson
Checkoff Spat Sparks Pushback: OCM Director May Lose Seat on State Farm Bureau Board

Chris Clayton, DTN Ag Policy Editor | Mon Oct 8, 2012 12:54 PM CDT OMAHA (DTN) — The Mississippi Farm Bureau\board of directors may vote to boot a director off its board because of his role in litigation involving the beef checkoff. Fred Stokes, a 77-year-old retired Army veteran who has run a small cattle operation in Mississippi, has spent much of his time over the past several years raising…
Read more...Tags:Beef Checkoff , Fred Stokes , HSUS , Humane Society of the United States , meatpackers , Mike Callicrate , Mississippi Farm Bureau , National Cattlemen's Beef Association , USDA , Vilsack
Lies, distortions and lawsuits

Farm and Food File for the week beginning Sunday, Aug. 26, 2012 by Alan Guebert Somewhere along the line it became acceptable to bend and break the record of public figures and firms without any consequence whatsoever. Shortly thereafter distortion and deception replaced discussion and debate and yelling and lying replaced compromise and progress. And that’s just in agriculture; in politics it’s even worse. The latest farm and food fight…
Read more...Tags:Alan Guebert , Beef Checkoff , Farm and Food File , Fred Stokes , HSUS , NCBA , OCM , Organization for Competitive Markets , Polsenelli Shughart , Ranch Foods Direct , USDA
Allies of competitive markets to gather in Kansas City

PRESS RELEASE Organization for Competitive Markets P.O. Box 6486 Lincoln, NE 68506 www.competitivemarkets.com Contact: Fred Stokes 662 476 5568, cell 601 527 2459 tfredstokes@hughes.net August 6, 2012 KANSAS CITY, MO. — This week’s annual convention of the Organization for Competitive Markets will start out with a bang, as a bold new strategy to combat misuse of commodity check-off programs is unveiled at a pre-convention press conference Thursday afternoon. “We will…
Read more...Another Market Reformer Quits

Thomas F. “Fred” Stokes President On January 26th, J. Dudley Butler resigned his position as the livestock industry’s top cop. It was a sad day for independent livestock producers and poultry growers. There was lots of excitement and enthusiasm as the Obama Administration’s Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Department of Justice (DOJ) forged an historic joint effort to deal with the long-neglected concentration and market power abuse in agriculture. But…
Read more...Tags:Dudley Butler , Fred Stokes , GIPSA , GIPSA rule , GIPSA Rules , Market Reform , OCM , Packers & Stockyards Act , PS&A , USDA , USDA Proposed Rules
What’s Ahead for American Agriculture?

Thomas F “Fred” Stokes President After attending an OCM retreat near Kansas City in 2000, noted writer William Greider wrote an article containing this rather apocalyptic bit of prophecy. “The contemporary triumph of free-market capitalism has revealed to farmers, if not to other Americans, the bitter last act in this drama. Farmers can see themselves being reduced from their mythological status as independent producers to a subservient and vulnerable role…
Read more...Tags:beef checkoff audit , Fred Stokes , M.F. Global , market concentration , vertical integration







