Tyson, Others Face New Cartel Claims, Now From Chicken Farmers

Tyson Foods Inc., Pilgrim’s Pride Corp., and other top poultry processors were hit with a federal antitrust lawsuit in Kansas City, Kan., alleging an industrywide scheme to drive down compensation for the permanently indebted “modern-day sharecroppers” who raise chickens for them.

The processors “illegally agreed to share detailed data on grower compensation with one another, with the purpose and effect” of artificially depressing it, the suit says.

They also used a “no poach” agreement—a pledge not to solicit one another’s chicken “growers"—"to insulate themselves from normal competitive pressures that could potentially erode the effects of their information sharing ...