Tyson Foods has announced that it will be closing its Perry, Iowa pork processing plant. According to the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN), the closure will take place on June 28 and will impact 1,276 employees.

According to a Tyson Foods spokesperson, the difficult decision was made after careful consideration and the firm understands the impact the closure will have on team members as well as the local community.

"Taking care of our team members is our top priority and we encourage them to apply for other open roles within the company. We are also working closely with state and local officials to provide additional resources to those who are impacted. While this decision was not easy, it emphasizes our focus to optimize the efficiency of our operations to best serve our customers. Iowa remains a key state for Tyson Foods, with employment of more than 9,000 team members across our other Iowa facilities." 

According to Steve Meyer, an economist with Ever.ag, the plant has a capacity of 9,000 head per day and is strictly a single-shift plant.

In his National Hog Farmer column Monday, Meyer noted the announcement was "not a huge surprise as it has been rumored for some time that Tyson was considering this change." He expects Tyson will likely take on some of these pigs at its other Iowa locations, including Storm Lake and Waterloo. Those plants have capacities of 17,250 per day and 19,500 per day, respectively. Tyson’s Columbus Junction plant can process 10,350 head per day. 

However, Meyer anticipates the plant shutdown will have an impact on national production and hog prices.

"The closure will put national weekly slaughter capacity at roughly 2.65 million head assuming a 5.4 day workweek. My forecasts have slaughter per kill day up 0.6% this fall. This reduction in capacity will make conditions very snug again this fall if those slaughter levels occur, putting some pressure on spot purchase prices for hogs," Meyer notes.