March 8, 2021 | Vol. 14 : No. 2
As the 2012 drought was to the cattleman, this pandemic has been to the restaurateur.
The foodservice sector is one of the main demand drivers for U.S. beef. As everything from business travel to tourism was curtailed in the past year, it’s had trickle-back repercussions throughout the industry.
The cattle industry, and all of agriculture for that matter, is loaded with risk. For someone who is risk-averse, farming and ranching definitely isn’t a very good career choice.
Of course, it starts with Mother Nature. Floods, droughts, blizzards and fires are all factors we acknowledge have huge effects on the business, but there’s little we can do to control them.
For the eighth consecutive year, U.S. News and World Report ranked the National Institutes of Health-developed DASH Diet “best overall” diet among nearly 40 it reviewed. The announcement came just as new research suggests that combining DASH, or Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, with a low-sodium diet has the potential to lower blood pressure, as well as or better than many anti-hypertension medications.
Record calf birthdates this calving season to track calving distribution.
“Evaluating a calving distribution takes very little time, but can provide valuable insight into reproductive performance and productivity of the herd,” says University of Missouri Extension veterinarian Craig Payne.
Bipartisan legislation was introduced to create new opportunities for cattle producers and processors to market beef products. Introduced by U.S. Representatives Dusty Johnson (R-SD) and Henry Cuellar (D-TX), the Direct Interstate Retail Exemption for Certain Transactions (DIRECT) Act of 2021 would allow retail quantities of meat processed under state inspection to be sold across state lines through e-commerce, providing beef producers and local processors alike with more options to market directly to consumers.
The executive committee of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association approved the organization’s top 2021 policy priorities at its winter meeting with a continued focus on advocating for a business climate that increases opportunities for producer profitability.
Note: The original photo used to create this month’s theme icon was an entry by Harlow Gorman in the 2020 NJAA/Angus Journal Photo Contest.