October is a wrap

Key takeaways:

Argentina: Long on noise, short on effect.

A new cattle price plateau?

R-Calf urging M-COOL passage.

Lifting Chinese trade barriers.

Texas screwworm tiff.

Hubbub over Argentina

Throughout October, President Trump’s plans to increase beef import quotas from Argentina drew incredible attention to the U.S. meat case. The beef business has not been so heavily scrutinized since December 2003 and the days after BSE was discovered in a Washington state dairy cow.

The industry also has not seen so much unity. From NCBA to R-Calf USA, cattle industry groups collectively condemned Trump’s proposal to intervene in U.S. beef markets by increasing Argentina’s annual U.S. export quotas from 20,000 metric tons (MT) to 80,000 MT.

And along with the industry chatter, consumers joined in on the rhetoric. From the supermarket to social media, questions, concerns and opinions were raised about the U.S. beef supply in degrees not seen in decades.

But taking the emotion and politics out of Trump’s proposal, economists and industry analysts said the Argentine issue was long on noise and short on effect.

Darrell Peel from Oklahoma State University explained that if the U.S. took all of the projected 2025 Argentine beef exports, that amount would represent less than 2.5% of the total U.S. beef supply. He added that if Argentina fulfilled the proposed quota, the added increase would have a negligible impact on retail supply of beef in the U.S. And holding all else equal, Peel said an additional 60,000 MT would only add 0.27 pounds to U.S. per capita net beef supplies, which currently sits at 59.1 pounds.

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Additionally, CattleFax’s Matthew McQuagge stated that if spread across a 12-month period, this addition would likely have little impact on lowering beef prices at the retail level.

Higher, higher, higher

All month long, cash cattle prices rang with the call of radio legend Evan Slack: “Higher, higher, higher!”

When 400-weight weaned steer calves reach well into the $5 range, you know you’re in a good market. And optimism is obvious when old granny cows are fetching north of $3,100/head. The cows might be short-term, but the thinking is long-term.

And on the other end, even as winter approaches, there seems to be no cooling off in consumer demand for beef.

“Cattle prices have reached a new pricing plateau,” said Dan Basse, AgResource Company president, while speaking at a Certified Angus Beef forum recently . He estimated beef sales will bring in $113 billion in the U.S. alone this year. And more good news, Basse said, is that the “younger generation” likes protein.

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“If you had told me last year that the retail price of beef could be somewhere in the vicinity of $9.50 per pound, and we had no demand rationing, no shifting to chicken or pork, I would have told you you’re crazy,” Basse said.

Another stab at M-COOL

Harriet Hageman (R-WY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA) reintroduced the Country of Origin Labeling Enforcement Act in the U.S. House. The law aims to reinstate mandatory country-of-origin labeling (M-COOL) for beef. Meanwhile, a companion bill in the U.S. Senate, the American Beef Labeling Act S.B. 421 , sponsored by South Dakota’s John Thune, would require all beef sold in grocery stores to be labeled with its country of origin.

Beginning in 2002, Congress passed a series of laws implementing M-COOL for select commodities, including beef. However, the World Trade Organization ruled that U.S. country-of-origin labeling laws were in violation of WTO rules, and Congress removed COOL for beef in 2016.

Current voluntary country-of-origin guidelines are ineffective as global corporations that control over 85% of the beef market choose not to label beef origins, claimed R-Calf USA CEO Bill Bullard. “M-COOL puts power back in the hands of consumers and supports the long-term survival of America’s farmers and ranchers.”

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R-Calf is asking producers around the U.S. to pony up and support the proposed MCOOL bills. By the end of October, R-Calf USA had raised $2,570 in donations intended to help urge Congress to pass M-COOL.

Other trade matters

The Meat Institute called on the Trump Administration to build on the America First Trade Policy agenda’s recent success in Europe, the U.K. and Southeast Asia by continuing to address remaining significant barriers to trade in markets important for the meat and poultry industry.

Exports add value to every animal produced and, in turn, increase demand for U.S. corn and soybeans, said Meat Institute president and chief executive officer Julie Anna Potts. “On average, U.S. beef exports yield more than $400 in value per head of cattle.”

Potts noted that the industry’s export potential remains limited by unjustified sanitary barriers, prohibitive tariffs and tariff rate quotas, and onerous registration and approval requirements for exporting facilities.

Elsewhere, the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) applauded Trump’s progress on late-month trade negotiations with China.

“If the removal of non-tariff barriers means that China will promptly renew the U.S. beef plant and cold storage registrations it has allowed to expire over the past nine months, this will restore access to a critical beef export market,” said Dan Halstrom, USMEF president and CEO. “We are anxious to see further details on these issues.”

Corner-crossing

Western U.S. ranchers continue to fight encroachment into their businesses by recreational and environmental pursuits. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a Wyoming case that now allows “corner crossing” on federally-managed land in areas with checkerboard land ownership.

By leaving corner-crossing legal, property owners’ rights in at least six states are threatened, land values are under pressure, and grazing leases are threatened. Property owners will be watching similar access conflicts across the country.

Colorado’s wolf woes

The Trump administration told Colorado wildlife managers to stop importing gray wolves from Canada as part of the state’s efforts to restore the predators. Wolf proponents say this is a shift that could hinder plans for more reintroductions of the predator species this winter.

The state has been releasing wolves west of the Continental Divide since 2023, where the mood in rural areas does not favor wolf reintroduction. Under the recent ruling, “new” Colorado wolves must come only from other northern Rocky Mountain states. There appears to be little mood, though, in those states to give Colorado any wolves.

Prairie preserve grows

American Prairie added another huge chunk of land to its vast bison preserve in Montana. Located southwest of Havre, Montana, the Anchor Ranch covers 67,960 acres—22,837 deeded acres, with the rest federal and state leases. The transaction stands as the second-largest land purchase by American Prairie .

The preserve now controls nearly 600,000 acres of former cattle and sheep ranchland that it plans to use for wild bison and sagebrush restoration. “This acquisition is important as a way to return public access to the people so they can explore, hunt, and recreate on land that’s been off-limits for many years,” stated Alison Fox, American Prairie CEO.

Screwworm headbutting

Although Mexico continues to confirm new cases of New World Screwworm (NWS), the overwhelming majority of the cases remain in the far southern part of the country, with no significant northward expansion over the past month. The two northernmost detections (approximately 70 and 170 miles from the U.S. border, respectively) occurred in Nuevo León in young cattle transported from Chiapas, Mexico.

Meanwhile, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller promoted his solution to control the advancement of the NWS. He plans to deploy baited traps, which he estimates would kill 90% of NWS. The bait, commercially known as Swormlure-5, is designed to attract adult screwworm flies.

But Miller’s proposal put him at odds with USDA and Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins.

“The only thing they (USDA) have to combat the screwworm fly itself is sterile flies,” Miller said, “But we don’t have enough of them (sterile flies).” He said it makes sense to use the bait traps first. “Then you come in behind that with sterile files and mop up the other 10%.”

The USDA responded to Miller’s comments by saying the federal agency “can no longer keep wasting its time and personnel to deploy Commissioner Miller’s infamous traps which USDA has deployed, tested, and has proven ineffective.”