Thursday, November 10, 2011

D.C. food seminar turns its attention to concentration of ownership in meatpacking

George Washington University is conducting a "Seminar on Food" series, and the second event will address the market concentration of meatpacking. A panel discussion will include Barry C. Lynn, senior fellow at the New America Foundation and author of Cornered: The New Monopoly Capitalism and The Economics of Destruction; Mark Halverson, staff director for the Senate Agriculture Committee; and Patrick Woodall, research director and senior policy advocate for the lobby group Food & Water Watch.

According to a release about the event, "just four companies currently control over 80 percent of the cattle packing market." Lynn will "provide the context we can use to decipher a monopoly issue" like this. Halverson helped Sen. Tom Harkin "challenge meat packing monopolies in the language of the 2008 Farm Bill." And Food & Water Watch has "kept an eye on the implementation of the specific anti-trust provision in the 2008 Farm Bill and will report on their research and describe the methods through which a delicate and complicated issue such as this can be studied."

The event, "Monopoly Meat," will be held Nov. 21 from 2 to 4 p.m. in Duques Hall on GWU's campus in Washington, D.C. To learn more click here.

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