R-calf

The U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., ruled a lawsuit brought by independent ranchers who say the Beef Checkoff Program threatens their livelihood can go forward. The court’s opinion denied a motion to dismiss by the USDA, writing that the ranchers have successfully alleged they have “associational standing” to challenge USDA’s practices. The case will proc ...

A new effort from USDA to bring transparency to cattle pricing is getting a lukewarm response from the industry, and some criticism. R-CALF USA CEO Bill Bullard said the problem is that large amounts of cattle taken out of the cash market that don't contribute to price discovery ...

R-CALF USA recently sent a white paper to the Senate Agriculture Committee calling for mandating large packing plants to purchase at least 50% of their cattle needs from negotiated cash cattle markets. R-CALF USA says the white paper provides real-time evidence that varying minimum cash cattle purchase requirements region-to-region will allow major beef packers to continue denying timely market a

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack this week granted an extension to organizers of the National Beef Checkoff Petition Drive until October 3rd, 2021. The extension grants extra time for organizers to collect the necessary signatures on the petition calling for a producer vote of the National Beef Checkoff Program ...

R-CALF recently submitted comments to the USDA that identified two factors as, what the organization called the core structural problems causing the current crisis in the U.S. cattle industry. R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard said the first factor, concentration in the beef packing sector, created the second problem ...

A bipartisan effort is underway in Washington D.C. to manage what some have called a food crisis when it comes to the prices livestock producers receive. R-CALF USA CEO Bill Bullard said consumers are paying rapidly higher prices at the store, but cattle prices are collapsing ...

National Cattlemen’s Beef Association CEO Colin Woodall says terminating the beef checkoff would hurt cattlemen. Back in July, two groups, R-CALF USA and the Organization of Competitive Markets, petitioned USDA to terminate the national beef checkoff program. Woo ...

Recently, senators Mike Rounds, Republican from South Dakota, and Tina Smith, a Democrat from Minnesota, wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland regarding the state of the U.S. meatpacking industry. They asked him to enforce or examine America’s antitrust laws to restore fairness in the marketplace for cattle producers and are asking their colleagues in both the House and Senate to

R-Calf USA recently penned a letter to President Joe Biden expressing concerns over proposed changes to federal procurement regulations for beef. CEO, Bill Bullard, said the group told the President he could strengthen the domestic cattle supply chain by changing the current standard to requiring that only animals born, raised and slaughtered in the United States be eligible for U.S. product des

The USDA is out with its December cattle and beef trade data, meaning a full view of 2020 is now possible. Imports of beef are continuing to soar, with an all-time high of 4.4 billion pounds coming into the country in 2020. The data shows the average price of fed cattle in 2020 was just under $1 ...