R-CALF Grows As Small Ranchers Line Up Against NAFTA, CAFTA, Big Packers

[hatrack]

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Staking its ground against the Bush administration and meatpackers, who depend on a steady supply of cattle, R-Calf contends that the threat of mad cow disease is still too great to allow Canadian cattle into the United States. "Our competitive advantage is we produce the best beef under the best conditions," said Bill Bullard, chief executive of R-Calf. The Department of Agriculture, Mr. Bullard said, was "attempting to compromise those very health and safety standards" by allowing the import of Canadian cattle.

For years, most cattle producers were part of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, based in Colorado, whose members include large packers and cattle feeding operations. But issues like the North American Free Trade Act, the recent Central America Free Trade Act, mad cow disease and mandatory country of origin labeling have fenced off segments of the industry. Producers have found themselves on the other side of many of these issues from packing houses like IBP and Tyson.

"Anything we've brought forward to help U.S. cattle producers be more competitive, N.C.B.A. has been opposed," said Leo McDonnell, the president and founder of R-Calf, who breeds bulls near Columbus, Mont. "As great as the global market is, we're a dying industry."
An obituary may be premature, but the number of cattle has fallen, to 104 million this year from 125 million in 1981, and producers declined to 989,000 in 2004 from 1.3 million in 1989, according to Agriculture Department statistics.

Some industry observers are surprised by the growth of R-Calf. If anything, ranchers are seen as independent types not quick to join organizations. But the group speaks the same language as its members and is narrowly focused on ranchers' concerns.

"R-Calf is run by people who look and talk like cowboys," said Mikkel Pates, a reporter for Agweek in Fargo, N.D., who has written about the organization. "And they are." Ty Thompson, a member of R-Calf with a small feeding operation in Lockwood, Mont., said ranchers liked R-Calf "because it's a grass-roots organization that they can talk to."

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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/14/national/14calf.html?pagewanted=all

[Sorwen]

1. R-CALF is just wrong

R-CALF is a protectionist organization that only cares about making money. They are not basing their position regarding imports from Canada on science or concern for consumer health or safety. They're basing their stand on economics and self-interest. If we stop imports from Canada, domestic supply decreases and the prices they receive increase. They make more money. Canadian beef is hardly riskier than U.S. beef. Furthermore, their position on keeping live cattle imports from Canada banned makes little sense since boxed beef imports from Canada have been permitted for almost 2 years. So if we don't import the beef in the form of live animals, we can still import it in the form of boxed beef. So consumers are eating Canadian beef regardless of the ban on live cattle imports. I'm sure they would prefer to ban both live cattle and beef from Canada, but there is no scientific justification for that, and it would devastate the Canadian beef industry (but it doesn't seem like that would bother them).

Unfortunately for R-CALF, their position is short-sighted and likely to backfire. First of all, to keep saying that Canadian beef is not safe because of BSE will scare consumers away from beef, and not just Canadian beef but U.S. beef as well (BSE has also been discovered in the U.S. and R-CALF's rhetoric will seriously hurt demand for U.S. beef if more cases are discovered). Secondly, as a result of the ban on live cattle imports from Canada, the size of the meatpacking industry in Canada increased considerably so that they would not have to rely on exporting their cattle to the U.S. As a result of this, the Canadian beef industry is now more competitive with the U.S. beef industry. Canada has the capacity to export more beef to the United States than they did before, and they are more competitive in exporting beef to offshore markets. In the long-run, the U.S. beef industry will be hurt by this.

To sum up, I find R-CALF's arguments insincere and based on short-term economics without consideration for long-term effects. I also find their opposition to trade agreements pretty illogical since the U.S. beef industry clearly benefits from trade.