The head of R-CALF USA says current free trade policies are failing America’s independent cattle producers.
Bill Bullard tells Brownfield drastic changes are needed.
“We’re supporting, for example, the use of tariffs in order to ensure we can maintain a viable, productive cattle and beef industry in the United States,” he says. “And not continue to off-shore that to foreign nations and to become dependent on imported beef.”
Bullard says imported beef displaces the production of independent US producers, and says an overhaul of current trade strategies is crucial to the viability to the industry moving forward. “So our solutions include, Mandatory Country of Origin Labeling for beef,” he says. “So consumers can be empowered to choose whether to support the domestic supply chain or some foreign supply chain. And it includes resorting the reduced standards that we have accomplished since we entered the World Trade Organization.”
Bullard says the organization also wants to see health and safety standards strengthened and tariffs used as a strategic tool to increase production.
