President Biden met with farmers, ranchers and independent processors from across the country Jan.
Events like the COVID-19 pandemic, the Tyson fire and the JBS cyberattack have underlined the issues a lack of competition creates in the meat markets.
Phase I of this commitment will furnish $150 million to jump-start approximately 15 projects, beginning this spring, with Phase II to follow in the summer.
The USDA will dedicate funding to supporting employee training and safe working conditions and promote innovation via publicly accessible expert knowledge to help independent processors create new capacity or expand existing capacity.
The Department of Justice and the USDA also announced a new joint initiative to better coordinate their efforts to crack down on market competition, which includes a new portal for reporting concerns about potential violations of the competition laws, set to go live by early February.
This process has already begun, with the USDA including more data in their cadre of reports.
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