Des Moines, Iowa ? Iowa’s ban on meatpackers owning livestock operations is unconstitutional, a federal judge in Des Moines ruled.

“This ruling can only be viewed as devastating to family farmers in Iowa,” Curtis Meier, of Clarinda, president of the Iowa Pork Producers Assn., said following Wednesday’s opinion. “The Iowa law, first adopted in 1975, was intended to allow packers to be packers and let farmers raise pigs.”

U.S. District Judge Robert W. Pratt on Wednesday upheld the claim of Smithfield Foods Inc., the world’s largest pork processing company, that Iowa’s ban on packer ownership of livestock is an unconstitutional infringement on interstate commerce.

Richard Poulson, Smithfield’s executive vice president and general counsel, welcomed the opinion.

Atty. Gen. Tom Miller said his office was studying the decision, but he expected to appeal it to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals.