hi I'm Mike what would you do if you went to your favorite fast-food place
and instead of McDonald's you ended up with Burger King well that's the old
switcheroo and somebody is playing it on you with the beef that you buy at your
local grocery store today we take an important in-depth look at where your
beef comes from on our wyoming life
in the grocery store you know if the mango you buy was imported from Mexico
or Bermuda or the West Indies there's a sticker right there on it you want to
buy a chicken you can look right here on the label and it tells you where it was
hatched raised and harvested this one here in the US so why is the same
sticker on a steak causing so many problems in the spring of 2008 my wife
Erin and I were working corporate jobs in America just like over 90 percent of
the US population I had no tied to agriculture at all at
least at a hands-on level in October of 2008 I suddenly found myself in a new
role on the family ranch in Wyoming we had made the decision to move back to
Aaron's hometown to help out Gilbert my father-in-law with his cow count
operation little did I know how much it would change my perspective and make me
see how important it is to know where your food comes from there are laws on
the books called country of origin labeling or cool laws for short now that
states that products are required to carry labels that tell you if the
product was imported from another country it's that simple
the US Department of Agriculture's own statement says that the program is
neither a food safety or traceability program but rather a consumer
information program cool provides information that consumers have a right
to know before making a purchase but what about beef for some reason beef is
exempt from cool laws that means as a consumer if I go to the store there's no
legal obligation to tell me where my steak or hamburger came from the only
way that I would know is if a producer chooses to label it which some do but a
lot don't the big question is why why is beef exempt from a law that covers
chicken clothing electronics fish and dang near anything you can buy online or
in person to get started let's take a look at the
law cool was first established in 1930 as part of the tariff act it stated
simply that every article of foreign origin imported into the US shall be
marked with this country of origin over time cool as it applies to meet has
changed and now states that beef is required to bear a label denoting the
foreign country of origin of the beef all the way to the consumer unless of
course the beef undergoes substantial transformation in the United States that
last part the undergoing of a substantial transformation has led to a
series of changes in the law a substantial transformation is often
taking a finished animal from another country and immediately butchering it
and packaging it for sale in the US often with it barely have even breathed
American air or touched American soil since 2015 with a rule by the World
Trade Organization Congress revised cool laws and the US Department of
Agriculture announced that it would no longer enforce labeling laws on beef
pork and turkey products the USDA argued that any beef and ported into the US as
a product of the u.s. even if it was born and raised in a different country
as long as that country has the food safety standards similar to that of the
US but here's the truth beef that carries a product of the USA label on it
doesn't mean that beef was raised in the States
all the slaughterhouse has to do is import the beef from abroad run it
through a USDA inspected facility packaged it and slap a sticker on it as
both a consumer and a producer of meat being sold locally and into the big
machine of the industrial meatpacking it's hard to be unbiased that's the
truth but I also come from a background where I really didn't care where my beef
came from and I can honestly say that before cool laws changed in 2015 I never
did look at the label that said where it was born and raised or butchered or
whatever but that might be what gives me a unique advantage also of course if you
don't agree with me then that's really ok too even if people are disagree
with you by the way at least they're thinking about a topic that you're
worried about as well us ranchers were hoping that a revised NAFTA agreement
last year would help require cool labels on beef that didn't happen and the
failure to require labels on beef continues to hurt the cattle industry
consumer awareness is also continuing to grow in the u.s. more people are now
thinking about how and where their food is grown and raised just look at the GMO
debate for proof of that but still our government and the USDA thinks that you
don't need to know where your beef and pork is coming from I think to really
understand why all you have to do is follow the dollar look at the politics
there are just over 1 million farms and ranches in the u.s. that sell and raise
cattle these are mostly still family-owned farms these ranchers then
sell their cattle into a program that's controlled by huge companies in fact 80%
of us finish beef comes from just four of these companies sounds crazy right
the leading cattle slaughtering and processing companies in the US are Tyson
Foods the nation's largest beef producer processing almost two hundred thousand
cows per week with beef sales of sixteen billion dollars alone in the last year
Cargill is the second with one of the largest privately held companies in the
world they processed 8 million cattle last year and clocked one hundred and
twenty billion dollars in annual sales third is jbs USA
that's a subsidiary of a Brazilian based company called jbs South America they're
the largest beef packer in the world and operate nine processing plants across
the Midwest and rounding out the list at fourth isten is national beef now they
have a market share of only 13% in fact jbs actually tried to buy them out in
2009 to believe that these four companies
have no say and how beef is bought and sold in the US would be completely naive
lobbyists for corporate meat packers have argued that all beef is the same
regardless of where it was born and raised ignoring environmental production
and food safety standards it's also been said that if consumers wanted country of
origin labeling marketplaces would voluntarily add them of course the label
product of the USA is meaningless if anybody can add it a USDA inspection
label also is often mistaken as a label of a US product as studies have shown
that due to the increased consumer awareness up to 90% of consumers want
labeling on their beef saying where their beef was born and raised and
slaughtered in the end though it comes down to money claims have been made
saying that country of origin labeling actually hurts US producers of cattle by
driving up costs in the beef supply chain now that's untrue as from 2013
2015 country of origin labeling was implemented and American cattle
producers received historically high prices for those years since 2015 beef
imports have equaled over 6.2 billion dollars per year to foreign Ranchers the
label that they can gain by shipping cattle to the US for processing assures
them a higher price than they can get by selling it locally but it also has an
effect on their environment and the entire world over 100 million acres of
the Amazon have been deforested in Brazil the number one exporter of beef
to the US to make way for pasture for the product of USA beef I believe that
when Americans buy product of the USA beef that label assures that not only of
the quality of the product that they're feeding to their families but also the
want for consumers to support their neighbors and hardworking American
ranchers and farmers the product of the USA tag tells them
that they're doing that although in reality it's only hurting the American
producer since 2015 cattle prices have dropped from 3 dollars and 67 cents per
pound paid to cattle producers to two dollars and $0.19 in just our simple
little operation here of about 150 cows that difference accounts for an average
loss of about $600 per calf or $90,000 per year and income that would continue
to support the ranch and keep the ranch going for future generations
the big question though is how does this translate to the consumer well in 2015
the average price for ground beef according to the Bureau of Labor
Statistics was $4 a 16 cents so far in 2019 the average is three dollars and
seventy eight cents that's it that's a decrease of ten percent due to the
import of beef to the US now during the same time frame farmers and ranchers
have seen a decrease in their income of 40 percent in the price of cattle sold
into the food supply doesn't balance out as grass-fed beef also becomes more
common in your grocery store don't think that it's immune to these issues as well
seventy-five percent of the grass fed beef consumed in America comes from
Australia New Zealand or Uruguay and is labeled as product of the USA us cattle
producers are going to continue to fight to get cool reinstated so are we
it will support America's rural economy it'll reduce market manipulation create
competition in the beef market and put a stop to deceiving consumers for us it's
a battle that we'll fight until they succeed and you can help whether you're
a producer or a consumer no matter if you make the food or just enjoy it you
have a role to play share this video share this message I don't care make
your own video put a note on Facebook or your blog or post or just make it a
discussion with your friends and family there's a place for imported beef in the
u.s. import export and trade is important to our economy but all I ask
is that we stop misleading Amer and people and we stop blaming American
cattle producers for environmental disasters when it's lobbyists and those
policies that are causing countries to destroy rainforests to supply them with
what they call USA produced beef I care about the world I care about America and
those that live here and I want everybody to be able to make a choice
about the beef they buy after all isn't that what a democracy is all about think
back maybe if you're old enough to those windiest commercials from the 80s
where's the beef well now today maybe it should be where's the beef from and when
in doubt shop local find a local producer in your area or within driving
distance buy what you can and know for sure where a few steaks or a couple of
pounds of hamburger really came from thanks for coming along today please
comment below let me know if you want to be lied about about where your beef
comes from or if you just rather the industry be honest and let you make your
own choice until next time have a great week and thanks for joining us in our
Wyoming life
you