Photo Credit: R-Calf USA, Ryan Vig

Interview with members of the R-CALF Board of Directors, Karina Jones, Shad Sullivan, Brett Kenzy, Eric Gropper, and Gerald Schreiber.

In response to 2020’s unforeseen challenges in the U.S. cattle industry, R-CALF USA’s board of directors have spent the last several months developing the first ever long-range plan for cattle producers, the Cattle Industry Long Range Plan.

This plan lays out a five-year roadmap for U.S. cattle producers, and it also supplies the means to measure the cattle industry’s success as the plan unfolds. It includes strategies that promote profitability and prosperity for family-owned and family-operated cattle operations. Additionally, the plan focuses on increasing profitability in America’s rural communities.

The Cattle Industry Long Range Plan focuses on preserving and protecting cattle producers’ freedoms and liberties by ensuring producers remain free to make their own production and marketing decisions. This plan greatly differs from the beef packers “Beef Industry Long Range Plan” that was released earlier in 2020. The packer’s plan focuses on bringing U.S. cattle producers into compliance with the packer’s goals of obtaining more control over cattle producers through strategies that increase production costs.

RCALF’s Cattle Industry Long Range Plan has four objectives:

1. 1. Grow domestic and export demand for beef from United States-born, United States-raised, and United States-harvested cattle by promoting the United States’ unparalleled commitment and investment to cattle husbandry practices and beef quality and safety.
   2. Improve cattle-sector profitability for the United States cattle farmers and ranchers by expanding available marketing outlets and increasing both competition and transparency within domestic and export markets for cattle and beef.
   3. Intensify efforts to preserve and protect the liberty and freedom of United States independent cattle producers to adopt production practices of their choosing based on their assessment of competitive market forces.
   4. Elevate the United States cattle industry’s critical role in achieving the United States’ food security needs for an uninterrupted supply of high-quality, United States-produced beef protein.

RCALF USA continues to fight for the profitability and viability of independent U.S. cattle producers. To achieve this, the organization has focused on issues such as mandatory country-of-origin labeling (COOL), checkoff reform, animal identification, livestock price reporting, animal health concerns, captive supplies and packer ownership of livestock and various trade agreements.