There are more and more disturbing photos circulating on social media of what is happening at farms across the Midwest, and in our very own back yards. Piles of euthanized hogs outside of confinement buildings that reach nearly as long and as high as these buildings themselves flash through news feeds, Snapchats and prevail on Instagram. On Wednesday, 4th District Congressman, Steve King, announced he is drafting legislation to provide relief to those producers forced to euthanize millions of market-ready fat hogs due to packing plant shutdowns. These COVID-19-driven closures and slowdowns will result in unprecedented losses for hog farmers. “This once in a lifetime pandemic has placed our pork producers in a horrible situation in which they are forced, through no fault of their own, to euthanize their market-ready hogs at great loss rather than have them processed and delivered to American dinner tables.” The goal of this legislation is to provide vital funds to help cover some of these losses and allow producers to remain in the business of “feeding the post-lockdown world.” He wants to target per-head funding for those hogs that cannot be sold for harvest and it will require ownership as a condition for receiving indemnification.
