An employee returns carts at a Jewel Osco grocery store in Niles on Nov. 4, 2022. Kroger is offering $24.6 billion to acquire one of its rivals, Albertsons, the parent company of Jewel Osco.to acquire one of its rivals, Albertsons.So far, President Joe Biden’s administration has failed to block Cargill’s acquisition of Sanderson Farms, Walmart’s purchase of Sustainable Beef LLC and the U.S. Sugar-Imperial Sugar merger.
According to government and corporate accountability nonprofit Food and Water Watch, last year, Walmart’s share of food retail was 34.8%, followed by Kroger at 13.9%, Costco at 12.2% and Albertsons with 8.1%. These four companies control nearly 70% of food retail. The COVID-19 pandemic made it clear that our current concentrated supply chains neither improve prices for farmers nor food access to consumers. From processors euthanizing livestock to farmers being told to plow under produce, bottlenecks in our food system’s supply chains destroyed markets as they wasted perfectly good food. As a result, 40% of farm income came from government payments in 2020.