Livestock Groups Sue USDA

Livestock Groups Sue USDA

I’m Lacy Gray with Washington Ag Today.

Earlier this month several meat and livestock organizations filed suit against the USDA in an effort to block implementation of a mandatory country of origin labeling rule finalized by the USDA in May. Included in the group of Plaintiffs is the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, the National Pork Producers Council and the North American Meat Association. In their suit the livestock organizations explain that “costs associated with this new inefficient process will drive some processors dependent on imports out of business and destroy the market for meat from imported livestock”. Also in the complaint they state “there is no legitimate justification for the new “Born, Raised, and Slaughtered” regime, and that the new final COOL regulations violate the First Amendment, which prohibits compelled-speech regimes in the absence of a substantial governmental interest”; primarily because these labels offer no food safety or public health benefit, yet impose costs the government modestly estimates at $192 million. Jack Field, Executive Vice President of the Washington Cattlemen’s Association offered these comments on the final COOL regulations.

FIELD: The NCBA is very concerned about the potential retaliatory response that we may see from our trading partners. Depending on which segment of the cattle industry you speak with you get a different response as to the level of support of the final decision. My hope is that as an industry we can get a solution that everybody supports and buys into that gives the consumer certainty and moves us forward, but we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

I’m Lacy Gray and that’s Washington Ag Today on the Ag Information Network.