Lean and Mean: US Meat-Packing in an Era of Agro-Industrial Restructuring

Abstract

A new wave of agro-industrialization has taken place in the US pork sector since the mid-1980s, Driven by changes in consumer demand and by restructuring in US meat-packing, agro-industrialization is centered around lean-meat production and involves alterations in genetics, feeding regimes, facilities construction, and management practices ‘down on the farm’, Two main expressions of intensive accumulation in US meat-packing are evident, but the lean-meat imperative is integral to both, There is a movement towards an increased scale and standardization of production as major meat-packing firms develop value-added meats for general consumption. Counter to this is the manufacture of boutique meats by firms that are poised to exploit health and food safety-related challenges to energy-intensive and capital-intensive ‘productivist’ agriculture, In this paper the current thrust of agro-industrialization in the US pork sector is examined in historical perspective, within the rise, decline, and recomposition of the postwar livestock–feed–meat complex. Attention is given to value-based marketing and pricing systems that many meat-packers have recently instituted to insure adequate supplies of lean hogs. In this paper it is argued that value-based pricing results in highly differentiated payments to producers, thus spurring demand by feeder-farmers for an array of new, commercial inputs—lean genetics, partitioning agents, medications—in hopes of refashioning the interior geography of the pig for profit.