The 1980s Farm Crisis and Debt

Ep 120: Mike Callicrate

Mike Callicrate runs Ranch Foods Direct and Callicrate Beef out of Colorado Springs and St. Francis, Kansas. He built a fully vertically integrated operation involving raising cattle, slaughtering on-site, cutting, and selling direct to consumers. Our conversation follows his life story from his childhood on a small Colorado farm, a rodeo scholarship that led him into an animal science degree, and years running large-scale feedlots before he became one of ten ranchers who sued major meatpacker IBP in 1996 over market manipulation, a case that ended in a $1.28 billion jury verdict the judge later overturned.

We get into why that loss pushed him to stop selling livestock and start selling meat instead, how Ranch Foods Direct's on-site slaughter facility, composting system, and bone char/biochar production work together, and the economics that separate a small direct-to-consumer operation from an industrial one. 

Key topics

- From rodeo and animal science to building and later rejecting industrial feedlots
- The 1996 lawsuit against IBP, the overturned $1.28 billion verdict, and the Packers and Stockyards Act
- How producers' share of the consumer dollar collapsed since 1970
- Fraud, political influence, and market consolidation
What "pink slime" and lean finely textured beef actually are
- The grass-fed/grass-finished labelling problem 
- Declining Ogallala Aquifer levels and what it means for ranching's future
- Building local maker-owned marketplaces as an alternative to scaling up

Timestamps:
0:00 – Intro + backstory: rodeo, animal science degree, early feedlots
6:00 – Building industrial feedlots, growing concerned with market concentration
12:00 – Decision to sue IBP, being blackballed by buyers
18:00 – The lawsuit's path to trial and the $1.28B verdict
30:00 – The judge's reversal + Packers and Stockyards Act explained
36:00 – Shifting from selling livestock to selling meat direct
44:00 – Building the on-site slaughter facility and circular waste model
52:00 – The "story of the steer" and producers' lost share of the consumer dollar
1:02:00 – Scaling down vs. scaling up: why direct/local beats commodity
1:10:00 – COVID, empty shelves, and the case for local food resilience
1:18:00 – Batista brothers, JBS, and meatpacking consolidation
1:28:00 – What pink slime is and how it's made
1:38:00 – Grass-fed/grass-finished labeling and imported beef
1:46:00 – Ogallala Aquifer decline and water scarcity
1:52:00 – Vision for maker-owned marketplaces and local food hubs

Find out more: 
https://www.mikecallicrate.com/

The Regenaissance Podcast explores the people, farms, and ideas rebuilding our food system from the ground up.