09/20/05 Beef Promotion Operating Cmte meeting

American Rancher September 20, 2005 The Beef Promotion Operating Committee is meeting tomorrow and Thursday in Rapid City, South Dakota in conjunction with the National Beef Cookoff competition. Cattlemen's Beef Board Chief Operating Officer Monte Reese, says this is an important meeting for establishing the direction of Beef Checkoff funded programs in 2006. Reese: "Well the Beef Promotion Operating Committee consists of 20 members. They are members elected by and from the Beef Board and .by and from state beef councils. Ten from each source. They have the responsibility of deciding ultimately what projects will be funded at the national level with beef checkoff dollars. They will be looking at projects that are proposed by a half dozen different potential contractors and selecting those that they think will do the best job of building demand for beef and therefore creating more profit opportunities for cattle producers." Reese says this week's meeting is just one step in the process. Reese: "Those committee priorities are then filtered into a budget committee process and from that a budget recommendation is developed. The Operating Committee then provides that budget recommendation to the Beef Board. Beef Board approves the budget. It goes back to the Operating Committee, again producers, and they will make the final decisions on which projects will be funded. With all that subject to the approval of USDA." Meanwhile, 20 of American's top amateur cooks are in Rapid City competing for the 50-thousand dollar Best of Beef grand prize in the 2005 National Beef Cookoff. I'm Bob Hoff.