CHICAGO • Smithfield Foods Inc., the world's biggest pork producer, is buying grain elevators and purchasing grain directly from farmers, a move that hits grain handlers already reeling from multiyear lows in corn and soybean prices.
The Virginia-based company bought two Ohio grain elevators in September. For the first time, it can ship grain directly from Ohio to feed the pigs that Smithfield slaughters at its Tar Heel, N.C., packing plant — the world's largest, processing about 32,000 hogs daily.
Smithfield now buys 65 percent of its animal feed directly from farmers, up from the 10 percent of feed it directly bought in 2010.
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