Cattle producers are concerned a fire at a Tyson meat processing plant in Holcomb could disrupt already strained processing operations.
The plant is closed indefinitely after Friday’s fire. Tyson has said it will reopen the plant but the timeline will depend on the extent of the damage.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports industry experts say the Holcomb plant processes about 6,000 cattle a day – about 6% of all the cattle processed in the U.S.
Finney County commissioner Larry Jones, a partner at J&O Cattle Co., said meat packing plants are already running at capacity because a record number of cattle are going to market.
In the first day of trading since the fire, cattle futures on Monday dropped $3 per hundred pounds, the maximum fluctuation allowed for a single day.