New CEO Believes NCBA is Building Bridges in the Industry

New CEO Believes NCBA is Building Bridges in the Industry

Russell Nemetz
Russell Nemetz
Long-time lead lobbyist for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, Colin Woodall, was recently named the organization’s chief executive officer. This past week, he participated in a meeting with the North American Meat Institute in Washington, D.C.

According to Woodall, having these cross-industry interactions is good for cattle producers, though he acknowledges how some stakeholders see it differently.

"You know, it's really easy in our industry to throw rocks to packers" said Woodall. "We see it all the time. We have seen it quite a bit here over the past couple of months in regards to the market turmoil and everything that happened after the Tyson Fire in Holcomb. But what separates in NCBA from the other groups is that we go out and we talk to people. We just don't throw rocks behind cover of a press release. We go out and have conversations because we feel that that's the only way that we can actually fix problems. And that's a conversation with members of Congress, with the administration, with NAMI, and anybody else. You have to build those relationships if you truly want to be effective in making change."

The meeting was comprised of what Woodall called a “barnyard panel” with representation from several protein-based ag organizations. They discussed a variety of topics, including Country of Origin Labeling, international trade, traceability and foreign animal disease preparedness.

The conference also broke out into a beef-specific meeting during which Woodall says the representatives from NAMI were able to learn about the Beef Checkoff and how it operates.

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