02/04/05 Latest news on beef front

A lot of things have been happening in the U.S. cattle industry over the last few days, highlighted by news from the last two days. It started with U.S.D.A. Secretary Mike Johanns testifying before the Senate Ag Committee on his agency's plan to reopen the U.S. border to Canadian live cattle and currently banned beef products on March Seventh. Johanns was quick to state that while he would not promise a reconsideration of the decision, he would wait until a U.S.D.A. technical team investigating the latest Canadian b.s.e. cases came back with their findings, and that the information would be transparent to both lawmakers in Washington D.C. and the public at large. Meanwhile, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association technical team that was in Canada recently for a similar investigation formally presented their findings to the Association's membership. The news from that report included conclusions that contaminated feed made prior to the 1997 feed ban was the culprit in all four Canadian b.s.e. cases, that Canadian beef was safe, and that the large U.S.D.A. estimates of live cattle that would cross the border into U.S. processing plants was an over estimate. The N.C.B.A. report says no more than 900,000 head of Canadian cattle would be shipped to the U.S. next year if the border was reopened March Seventh as planned. But maybe the most significant news came from a member of the U.S.  Japanese technical group working out details needed to get our beef back into Japan. Gary Smith said at the Cattle Industry Convention in San Antonio this week that all details should be ironed out within ten days and U.S. beef should start to be shipped to Japan by March. Smith's comments were made independently of U.S.D.A., which has not made public statements of when exactly Japan would reopen its border to U.S. beef products. While most of the focus of President Bush's recent State of the Union address focused on the looming battle over Social Security reform, the President did get some remarks in about agriculture. Specifically, how ag would benefit from a comprehensive energy bill, especially one that fosters increased production of ethanol and other renewable fuels. The Energy Bill was one key piece of legislation that was not adopted by Congress during the President's first term in office, but is expected a focal point in this second term. How the Energy Bill is shaped remains to be seen in lieu of the President's proposed fiscal year 2006 budget. Scheduled to be delivered to Congress Monday, the measure is expected to include across the board cuts in all categories including ag. The lone exemption from budget cuts is defense spending.