On Thursday, October 14, the National Agricultural Law Center (NALC) will host a webinar from 12 p.m. – 2 p.m. EST on the rules proposed by USDA’s Grain Inspection Packers and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA).

NALC staff attorneys will provide an overview of GIPSA’s proposed rule changes for poultry and livestock, review the rulemaking process, explain how to submit comments for the proposed rules, and end with a question and answer session.

The proposed rules clarify and strengthen the measures of the Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921 that protect farmers and ranchers and curb corporate control over livestock and poultry markets.  The Act makes it unlawful for meat and poultry packers and processors and companies that contract with farmers to raise hogs and poultry from engaging in any “unfair, unjustly discriminatory, or deceptive practice or device,” or to “make or give any undue or unreasonable preference or advantage to any particular person or locality in any respect, or subject any particular person or locality to any undue or unreasonable prejudice or disadvantage in any respect.”

The webinar access link is here.  For handouts and more information on NALC’s GIPSA workshops, see here.

See here for the archive of NSAC blog posts related to the proposed GIPSA rules.  The comment period for the proposed rules ends November 22, 2010.