Editor:
The following is a headline I read recently, “COOL is ruled WTO violation; NCBA agrees.” Are you kidding me?
The all-knowing minds at the NCBA have fought a battle so all of us independent cattlemen and women have no way to distinguish our product. What a great victory (if you are a foreign producer).
It is a sad day when the U.S. cattlemen cannot stand up and say, “I want a raised in the U.S.A. label on a T-bone steak.”
Everything a consumer buys has a label of origin on it, from clothes to tools, but we cannot put a label on the top beef in the world. They say it places an unfair advantage for the U.S. labeled beef, and I say what is the problem with that?
Whatever happened to letting the consumer decide? Most people I talk to want to know where their beef comes from and how it was raised. As far as I’m concerned, all of you folks who contribute to NCBA and/or Ohio Cattlemen’s are contributing to the demise of our industry.
The NCBA is motivated by one factor, and that is money. Its boards are fat with packer lackeys who look to produce foreign animals to fill their feed lots at a discount price and sell it to you — the consumer — without telling you what country it comes from.
If you are an independent cattlemen in this country, you better stand up and be heard, if not for the future of your industry, but for the future of the next generation.
NCBA and Ohio Cattlemen’s sold you down the river with Issue 2; now it is COOL, and right behind this will be animal identification.
It has to stop somewhere. I choose to buy U.S.A. products and that still means something to me, but with NCBA victories like this it will not mean anything in the future.
Trevor Stover
Lexington, Ohio
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Trevor,,thank you and I agree with you. i think all of Ohio livestock producers need to take a stand, we are all getting so screwed over,,this state is in big trouble and if people don’t stand stup together there will be no livestock or any animal ownership of any kind in Ohio!!
It realy make me mad that we can’t keep the beef we have raised in America, in America, instead it is sold to other countries who sell it back to us at a higher price then they bought it for to start with.It is just stupid,,we are paying high prices for beef,,mostly our own beef,,and there is no reason for it at all.Raise it here and keep it here.