News

Missouri pork producers will struggle to comply with Prop 12 guidelines

Missouri’s ag director says her state’s pork producers will struggle to comply with California’s Proposition 12 law.

Chris Chinn tells Brownfield independent producers will be impacted the most because retrofitting production facilities are extremely expensive. They’re losing anywhere from $35 to $40 for every hog that they raise right now, so to have that type of a loss right now and to go to a bank and ask to borrow millions of dollars to reconfigure your barns, it’s just not going to happen.”

She says pork products are the third biggest export from the state. “Being able to sell into that California market for the majority of our producers is going to be out of reach. They’re not going to be able to do it right now.”

Missouri Governor Mike Parson recently co-signed a letter with 10 other Republican governors rejecting Prop 12, California’s law that requires pork be raised in specific  ways.