118th Congress Agriculture and Food
S. 228: Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act of 2023
Introduced
- Introduced (completed)
- Passed Senate (not reached)
- Passed House (not reached)
- To the President (not reached)
- Became law (not reached)
Summary
This bill requires the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to take various actions to address transparency in contract terms and pricing in the cattle industry.
Among these requirements, USDA must maintain a publicly available library or catalog of contracts entered into between meat packers and livestock producers for the purchase of cattle, including any schedules of premiums or discounts associated with the contracts and other specific details. USDA must make this information available to producers and other interested parties in a monthly report.
The bill further requires USDA to establish five to seven regions encompassing the entire continental United States that reasonably reflect similar fed cattle purchase practices for processing plants and establish mandatory minimums for each region (i.e., the minimum percentage of cattle purchases that are required to be made through approved pricing mechanisms from producers that are not packers).
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Under the bill, approved pricing mechanisms are generally purchases of fed cattle made through a negotiated purchase, through a negotiated grid purchase, at a stockyard, or through trading systems or platforms where multiple buyers and sellers can regularly make and accept bids and offers.
The bill also establishes a maximum penalty for mandatory minimum violations by covered packers. Under the bill, a covered packer is a packer that has slaughtered an average of 5% or more of the number of fed cattle slaughtered nationally during the immediately preceding five calendar years.
Written by the Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress.
Roll calls
No roll call votes have been held on this bill.
Amendments
No amendments were offered to this bill.
Cosponsors
- Sherrod Brown D-OHOriginal
- Richard Blumenthal D-CTOriginal
- Mike Braun R-INOriginal
- Bill Cassidy R-LAOriginal
- Richard Durbin D-ILOriginal
- Steve Daines R-MTOriginal
- Joni Ernst R-IAOriginal
- Charles Grassley R-IAOriginal
- Kirsten Gillibrand D-NYOriginal
- Martin Heinrich D-NMOriginal
- Cindy Hyde-Smith R-MSOriginal
- Joshua Hawley R-MOOriginal
- John Kennedy R-LAOriginal
- Ben Luján D-NMOriginal
- Cynthia Lummis R-WYOriginal
- Mike Rounds R-SDOriginal
- Pete Ricketts R-NEOriginal
- Tina Smith D-MNOriginal
- Jon Tester D-MTOriginal
- Ron Wyden D-OROriginal
- Raphael Warnock D-GAOriginal
- Jeff Merkley D-OR
Who scored on this bill
- 1Deb Fischer SponsorDrew cross-party cosponsors, introduced2 events+6
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Introductions and cosponsorships count toward weekly caps and show no points.
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History
- Introduced in the Senate by Deb Fischer.
Show the full action history (2 actions)
- Introduced in Senate
- Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.