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A New Era for Tennessee’s Meat Producers

On May 13, Washington County, Tennessee, welcomed the opening of the Appalachian Producers Cooperative, a large-scale meat processing facility and the state’s first farmer cooperative in fifty years

The facility, located in Telford, Tennessee, addresses long-standing challenges, including pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions and waitlists of up to 160 head at smaller plants. It also will help meet rising consumer demand for quality locally sourced beef, pork, sheep, and goat products.

The idea for the cooperative began in 2017 when then-county mayor Dan Eldridge and UT-TSU Washington County Extension director Anthony Shelton discussed how the region’s cattle were high quality, yet producers sold calves to Iowa, Nebraska, and other states, with finished meat trucked back to local groceries.

“With family farms decreasing— accelerated by the loss of steady incomes after the tobacco buyout— and demand increasing for locally sourced, quality meat,” Eldridge says, “I was looking for a solution that would sustain our local farm community and satisfy customer preferences.”

Eldridge and Shelton envisioned a cooperative facility and asked if UTIA could assist with a feasibility study. The study, developed by institute agricultural economists, was promising, and Eldridge requested a business plan. Then funding challenges halted progress.

In 2021, Shelton approached Eldridge, now in the private sector, about pursuing grants from the federal American Recovery Plan Act and other sources. Funding was ultimately secured from that act, the Appalachian Regional Commission, the Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Washington County government, and a pivotal $6 million loan from Mountain Commerce Bank—for a total of $13 million. The project was back on track.

As construction progressed, Eldridge and Shelton emphasized education for local cow-calf producers. UT faculty and Extension specialists from the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Department of Animal Science, and the Center for Profitable Agriculture developed educational materials, launched workshops, and introduced pricing tools and other resources.

Now that the cooperative is operational, Shelton serves as UT Extension livestock marketing area specialist, aiming to strengthen a competitive regional processing supply chain and expand wholesale marketing opportunities. He and Eldridge hope to share their model with other regions and view the cooperative as a strong step forward for local meat production.

Helping a Region Overcome Hurricane Helene Devastation

UT Beef and Forage Center coordinator David McIntosh, an eighth-generation native of northeast Tennessee, watched with unease as Hurricane Helene approached his hometown of Chuckey.

“The night before it happened, I had a gut feeling I couldn’t quite explain,” McIntosh recalls. “I even called my uncle, wondering aloud if something bad was going to happen.”

Heavy rainfall from the September 2024 cyclone caused the Nolichucky River to rise 2 feet per hour. At its peak, 1.3 million gallons of water per second surged over the Nolichucky Dam near Greeneville—nearly double Niagara Falls. The flood waters tore through riverbanks, farmland, and communities, destroying roads and bridges and depositing debris and sediment. Thousands lost essential utilities. In Chuckey, one of the hardest-hit areas, residents had to evacuate.

As the flood set in, agricultural leaders across the state closely monitored the situation. Tennessee Commissioner of Agriculture Charlie Hatcher contacted UT Extension agricultural economists to begin assessing economic damage.

Economist Aaron Smith found that existing tools couldn’t capture the full impact on farmland and communities. So, he and information technology analyst Brad Wilson developed a new decisionmaking tool to quantify damage from flooding. The tool overlays satellite imagery with datasets to track changes in vegetation and land recovery. The tool is being designed for use in future disasters.

At the UT Northeast Tennessee AgResearch and Education Center in Greeneville, center staff and UT-TSU Greene County Extension staff took part in relief efforts— unloading truckloads of donated forage, human and animal food, and supplies from as far as Wisconsin and Illinois. The center also made forty-five acres available to support local cleanup.

Extension agents across the ten-county region have been vital to recovery efforts. UTIA also posted online resources to assist the public in recovering from both flood and tornado damage, resources that remain available online.

“For me,” says McIntosh, “this is a once-in-a-lifetime project—for the relief it brings now and the legacy it builds for future generations in northeast Tennessee.”

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