I agree with Goeff. It's an irony that die hard Capitalists so hate the competition their cherished system absolutely relies on.
The deregulation of the dairy industry in NSW was the greatest obvious rort in modern times. In one bold move, 'inefficient' farmers -who had only managed to successfully support their families and their communities for thirty, forty or fifty years- were sent to the wall as farm gate prices were halved, Woolies and Coles instantly upped their profit margins and consumers were asked to pay more, not less, for their dairy products.
Although first last and foremost a democrat, I have to admit the system is far from perfect. As increases in efficiency reduce the number of people required to produce food for the rest of us to less than 4% of the voting population, politicians don't have to care about farmers.
The un- and under- employed have a larger voting bloc.

The farmers need to get closer to the final customer to gain a higher price for their goods, or develop brand names that allow higher prices to be charged, "Angus Beef" is a good example.

Prices are always determined by the customer, as a seller you can only set the asking price. To gain higher prices any business must communicate how it will add value to the customer to choose its product, selling to middlemen will always make this difficult. Some producers may find it easier to choose to delegate the retail sales process to another organisation, others will do this themselves.

I have to disagree with you Geoff on the governments role in dealing with monopolies; far from being the party to get rid of a monopoly, governments are the ones who give the monopoly license to be established in the first place, either directly or through regulation and approvals processes which limit competition. Banking is a classic example with the Four Pillars approach, and how hard is it to get development approvals to build another airport in NSW to compete with Macquarie Banks Sydney airport?? The first point of call for any budding monopolist or oligopolist IS the government to plead your case for the right to operate, and the support to keep competition out.