Kansas City, Mo. ? Farmland Industries would be better off reorganizing than it would by taking any of the offers it has received for its meat business, according to the company’s lead bankruptcy attorney.

Smithfield Foods of Smithfield, Va., the country’s largest pork producer and processor, has said it wanted to buy Farmland’s meat businesses. Excel Corp. of Wichita, Kan., and Swift and Co., of Greeley, Colo., have been mentioned as potential buyers.

But creditors would get more of their claims paid if the company reorganized its business around Farmland’s beef and pork businesses, Farmland attorney Larry Frazen argued in court Tuesday.

Kansas City, Mo.-based Farmland, the nation’s largest agriculture cooperative, filed for bankruptcy court protection last May.

Farmland is finishing a deal to sell its fertilizer business to Koch Nitrogen of Wichita. The deal is valued at about $293 million.

Frazen said he expected the deal to be completed by the end of May.