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Question for COOLIES.

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But isn't a time of poor buying power and lower demand a poor time to add extra costs to your product? The money still has to come from somewhere to pay for it, and we all know where it won't be coming from........

Extra costs added to your product without an extra return to pay for them are not good, no matter what shape the economy is in. There is a cumulative effect, and if it adds up enough, like it is doing for us, that one extra kick can be what decides if you survive or not.

The Canadian cattle producers are in a position where all we need is that little bit of extra to put us all over the edge. Lots of us have already hit the wall, and gotten out, but pile some more bad economics on and even the die hards will be gone. It's just plain stubbornness that's keeping most of us here now. And it's just plain stubbornness that's giving us the will to keep on banging our heads up against the COOL wall. We've got nothing to lose.

So we just keep on plugging away. :roll: :roll:

If the cattle prices in the U.S. suffer long enough and go low enough during this recession, producers in your country will lose the appetite for slapping extra costs on that don't produce a return either. You'll be no different from us if it gets bad enough. We're just farther down that road than you are at the moment.
 
We're not adding extra costs to our product. That's an excuse the packers are using to get you to do their dirty work.
 
RobertMac said:
Sandhusker said:
You're not considering that a RECESSION might have an impact on cattle prices? Come on, man.
Rod and Ranchero, the packers are obviously smarter than you two and other blaming lower prices on COOL. The packers know that consumers spend less in a recession. The price of cattle would be down with or without COOL...it's the economy!!!!

andybob, what you say falls mostly on deaf ears. Thanks for sharing though!

I would like to make the packers testify in front of Congress about the costs of MCOOL and then about 2-3 years after implementation audit them for those costs. If they were found to have lied to Congress, send them to jail no matter how much money the CEO has.

These packers are so used to lying that they think nothing of it. Of course they are getting paid well for doing it.

Congress should show that they can indeed run the government for the public good or be taken out of office and the job given to those who can do it.
 
I disagree with that, but there's no sense in trying to prove it, because extra costs are easy to disguise, and only common sense will be able to see how you can't do all this segregating and monitoring for free.

So, how come you do believe that there are no extra costs for MCOOL, but don't believe how the corporations have been getting certain protectionists groups, who need not be named :roll: :roll: to do their dirty work by lobbying the U.S. government to throw up as many trade barriers as they can to close the border to Canadian cattle and beef? This assistance they've been getting from the lobby groups just serves to make sure they can utilize their captive Canadian market to the maximum in order to help bring down American prices.

If you don't think the big corporations have been using this cross border conflict to line their pockets, your dreaming. Every time a new idea comes out of the U.S. to try and increase your prices, they will counter it with one of their own to drive them back down. Publicly they will complain about the extra costs for things like MCOOL, or the extra problems at the border, but you better believe that quietly in the background they have people on their payrolls who's only job is to find ways to make things like this work to their advantage.

And this squabbling between the primary producers of their raw products only makes life easier for them. "Keep em fighting down on the farm, and they won't notice what we're doing." As long as American and Canadian cattle producers are diverted from the true problems, and spend all their energy on bickering amongst themselves, the big will only get bigger.

The only difference right now between Canadian and American cattle producers is that we are farther down the road to oblivion than you are. If things stay as they are now, you guys will be hot on our heels.
 
Kato. read andybob's posts...segregating and monitoring can pay producers premiums...and that's better than free!!!!!

If Canadian beef is as good as you Canadians believe it is, COOL is tailor-made for you...if you are willing to do the work to take advantage of it.

The only USDA certified guaranteed tender beef program(that I know of) requires Brahma influence. It's foolish to believe that only breed or fat content governs tenderness.
 
Kato, are all the abattoirs owned by the big packers or are there still independent operators that can be contracted into a network of producers wanting to create their own branded product. Promoting a new brand is more to do with work than extra cost, identify what you are already doing that you can use as a promotion, breed, feeding etc (Grassfed Hereford beef?). We are doing nothing new on this farm, the existing systems were promoted, then later the independant monitoring was introduced. Having a strong core of producers working together is needed to negotiate from a position of strength with the retailers/ importers.
I can empathise with your situation, wen we had UN sanctions imposed on us in Rhodesia in 1965, we had to rebuild our entire export market, but by the time we had re-organised, the beef industry was stronger than ever before. A big change for example, was having export abattoirs change to Halaal slaughter to send beef previously exported to Britain to UAE, boned top priced joints were airfreighted to Switzerland. Our Farmer's Union made sure our industry would never be held to ransom ever again, by politicians, this took planning, hard work and co-operation to make it work.
 
When asked about their confidence in the safety of food from different countries, 92% said they felt U.S.-grown food was safe, a far higher percentage than other countries. Food from Canada was regarded as the second safest and won the confidence of 42% of survey respondents
 
I was in the grocery store in Plentywood MT last night. The meat coler proudly displayed their compliance with COOL. The neon green sign said" Product of USA, Canada and Mexico" :?
 
Cool is having an effect on Mexican cattle. This country I'm in runs quite a few mexicans in a good winter. Typically it is the same price to by mexican cattle as American you make the difference in the gain. The packers are discounting or will be .05 at slaughter. So the price at the border has to be lower.
 
Big Muddy rancher said:
I was in the grocery store in Plentywood MT last night. The meat coler proudly displayed their compliance with COOL. The neon green sign said" Product of USA, Canada and Mexico" :?

That tells me you dont know much about M COOL................remember what I always said..............slowly but surely
good luck
 
Aztumbleweed said:
Cool is having an effect on Mexican cattle. This country I'm in runs quite a few mexicans in a good winter. Typically it is the same price to by mexican cattle as American you make the difference in the gain. The packers are discounting or will be .05 at slaughter. So the price at the border has to be lower.

Good,I would'nt give you a meskin dollar for every disease infected head of cattle down there..............good luck
 
What diseases do they have, HAY MAKER? What about the cattle in South America? Should the meat from those cattle be sold all around the world as it is? FMD/FAM rears its ugly head down there now and then, and they make adjustments accordingly. Then the selling resumes to places like the U.K. and the Middle East.

Do Mexican cattle have FMD/FAM? Do you believe our government would allow those cattle in if they did? What diseases?
 
pointrider said:
What diseases do they have, HAY MAKER? What about the cattle in South America? Should the meat from those cattle be sold all around the world as it is? FMD/FAM rears its ugly head down there now and then, and they make adjustments accordingly. Then the selling resumes to places like the U.K. and the Middle East.

Do Mexican cattle have FMD/FAM? Do you believe our government would allow those cattle in if they did? What diseases?

Have you ever been to mexico ?,evidently not,and I dont mean some BS field trip put on by some packer advocates,you ever wanna see the real mexico,cross in from Texas,learn the language,look listen and learn,you wont be askin these questions if you lived and worked around them,I believe our goverment as you call it,I suppose you are refering to the USDA,are controlled by the AMI,I will let you figure out what they will do for a dollar...............what do you think all this hell raisin is about ?
Study the board,its all there................good luck
 
I'll stay out of the Mexican argument. I'll leave that one to you guys. We've got enough of our own problems right now.

I spoke with a friend who works in a large feedlot last week. I was told that as of right now there is only one plant accepting Canadian fats. It's in Washington state.

It's a distance that requires the cattle be unloaded somewhere in transit.

Canadian cattle are not allowed to be unloaded.

Therefore the border is effectively closed to Canadian fats, at least those from the eastern side of the Prairies.
Sounds to me like MCOOL is pretty clearly a trade barrier. :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: Nobody needs to even pretend any more that it is about food safety. A blind man could see through that argument.

If anyone says the price has gone up because of COOL, they're falling for an illusion set up behind MCOOL, because nothing has changed except the perception that there is less Canadian beef on the market.

This is why. As of now the American packers in Canada have it all, just like back in 2003. A closed border. Cheap Canadian cattle. The beef from the plants here will make there way directly into the sections of your market outside of COOL. You will have not reduced the amount of Canadian beef in your system, and yet will have only succeeded in lining the profits of the big corporations with what is left of your neighbour's failing ranches and farms. And the extra profits go right on back to the head office in the States, bypassing the American cattlemen too.

MCOOL will not give higher prices to American cattle producers. It will give the illusion that something has been accomplished, but no more than that. The illusion will cost money, and take it directly from the pocket of the cattle producer, but will not increase any prices.

It's all smoke and mirrors anyway. You could take all the Canadian beef off your market and not be able to see a price difference, because when there aren't enough Canadian cattle left to run any big plants here, they'll shut them and switch the focus to South America. And then it get's even worse.

MCOOL will have done nothing but open the door to cheaper S.A. beef, and eradicated trade with one country with which the U.S. is on par with regarding things like drug use, feed, and quality in the raising of cattle, and expanded trade with countries known to have FMD, and which use practices that are detrimental to the environment.

As Haymaker would say....... Good luck.
 
Kato, what happened to this arguement; "With the expanded capacity in Canada now, the cattle will just quit travelling, and will be processed here. MCOOL will be the final piece of the puzzle, and will guarantee it. "
 
Sandhusker said:
Kato, what happened to this arguement; "With the expanded capacity in Canada now, the cattle will just quit travelling, and will be processed here. MCOOL will be the final piece of the puzzle, and will guarantee it. "

Fer Chissake Sandy. Have you ever been anywhere other than between your house and the office? :roll:
You guys have happily SH!T in your own nest and two other countries and you are either too blind or too naive to see it. :(
 
gcreekrch said:
Sandhusker said:
Kato, what happened to this arguement; "With the expanded capacity in Canada now, the cattle will just quit travelling, and will be processed here. MCOOL will be the final piece of the puzzle, and will guarantee it. "

Fer Chissake Sandy. Have you ever been anywhere other than between your house and the office? :roll:
You guys have happily SH!T in your own nest and two other countries and you are either too blind or too naive to see it. :(

You will hafta explain that to me,looks like we are right on target, M COOL first,Beef checkoff 2nd,promoting that good ole USA beef,and 3rd the "captive supply reform act"maybe there is a few dollars to be made in ranching yet ?
"gcreekrch" for many years canadians partnered with packers at the cost of a lot of good ranching families,never once giving a thought to captive supplies and markets south of the border.
good luck
 
HAY MAKER said:
gcreekrch said:
Sandhusker said:
Kato, what happened to this arguement; "With the expanded capacity in Canada now, the cattle will just quit travelling, and will be processed here. MCOOL will be the final piece of the puzzle, and will guarantee it. "

Fer Chissake Sandy. Have you ever been anywhere other than between your house and the office? :roll:
You guys have happily SH!T in your own nest and two other countries and you are either too blind or too naive to see it. :(

You will hafta explain that to me,looks like we are right on target, M COOL first,Beef checkoff 2nd,promoting that good ole USA beef,and 3rd the "captive supply reform act"maybe there is a few dollars to be made in ranching yet ?
"gcreekrch" for many years canadians partnered with packers at the cost of a lot of good ranching families,never once giving a thought to captive supplies and markets south of the border.
good luck

Fair enough BUT....

You want the Labeling but you don't want to ID your national herd in case someone might get caught with a sick cow or some other misdemeanor. :roll:
And branding doesn't fit the bill for ID. :wink:

We have a beef check-off that goes to our burocratical cattle assn's that have packer leadership. We have advertised our product and hired packer representatives to sell our meat to other countries. :roll: Don't think the same guys might be waiting in the wings in the U S to help spend your check-off dollars? :???:

My hat is off to you if you can limit packer ownership of cattle, even then they will have enough "affiliates" to keep a captive supply. In truth the number of Canadian ranch families that got in bed with the packers was quite small. I sure as heck haven't seen any direct benefit to me. You don't think there might be a few Americans/packer affiliates taking advantage of ALL of us.
Sounds a little school- yardy to me.

The two years we actually sold calves for big money was due more to cheap grain and a low Canadian dollar than anything else.

In my opinion the cattle cycle (we missed the high because of BSE) had more to do with your prices adjusting than opening the border did.
I wish I could have sold the load of old $ 295 bred cows a year ago for what the speculators were paying for them in S Dak and Neb.

Be Patriotic but think with your heads and your pocketbooks guys. :wink:
 
gcreekrch said:
Sandhusker said:
Kato, what happened to this arguement; "With the expanded capacity in Canada now, the cattle will just quit travelling, and will be processed here. MCOOL will be the final piece of the puzzle, and will guarantee it. "

Fer Chissake Sandy. Have you ever been anywhere other than between your house and the office? :roll:
You guys have happily SH!T in your own nest and two other countries and you are either too blind or too naive to see it. :(

It's flattering that you guys are crediting R-CALF for enacting COOL, but you forget that it was the US consumers who put the heat on Congress to get it.

All of the crap that's going on is noncompetitive acttions because of concentration of the packers. COOL didn't give them the power to pull this, they could do it all along. That should tell you what the real problem is. They're doing it now because COOL takes away a huge arrow out of their quiver.
 

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