CATTLEMEN’S COLUMN
keep moving forward
takeaways from cattle industry convention by CCA President Tony Toso There is a scene in the 2006 movie Rocky Balboa, one of Sly’s “later in life” productions, that has stuck with me since the moment I saw it. In this particular scene Rocky is confronting his son about the realities of life, and that it is not all sunshine and rainbows, and he is trying to get him to understand that no matter the amount of complaining or feeling sorry for himself he does, life will be life and he is going to just have to get tough and deal with it. It’s one of those moment’s that triggers reflection and a kind of “what’s it all about” thinking. In fact, I’ve even used it on my own kids when they were needing a shot in the arm. In short it goes something like this “It’s not about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward…that’s how winning gets done”. The daily challenges we face as cattle producers are really no different. We are continually getting hit with issues and situations that we must address and then we are required to make those tough decisions that can have positive or negative impacts on our operations and our livelihoods. They don’t come easy; we deal with the tough situations, and we figure out how to keep moving forward and to succeed in spite of the continual challenges. Last week in Houston at the 2022 NCBA Convention, CCA leadership was tasked and tested with one of those situations in the Live Cattle Marketing Committee meeting. Since the 2020 “marathon in the mountains” summer meeting in Denver where the 75% plan was conceived, the industry has been trying to find direction and solutions to equitably price fed cattle in hopes that it would translate into more negotiated trade, credible price discovery, market transparency and ultimately higher prices back to the ranch. To cut to the chase the 75% plan, while seeing increases in negotiated cash trade occur over the past year (in fact that part of the plan you could argue was successful), failed
8 California Cattleman March 2022
primarily due to lack of packer (Big four) participation of the plan. Within the 75% plan resolution, it did state that if the 75% plan failed, then NCBA would pursue regulation through legislation. At the same time as the industry was working through the 75% plan in 2021, two legislative “offerings,” that had been circulating about for the last couple of years, were brought up in the United States Senate. The first bill was from Sen. Deb Fischer of Nebraska known as the Cattle Market Transparency Act of 2021, and the second from Sen. Chuck Grassley (Spot Market Bill) from Iowa which was basically a one size fits all 50-14 proposal. The Fischer Bill would establish regional mandatory minimum thresholds of negotiated cash and negotiated grid trades. Over 2021, the two Senators eventually joined forces, with Senator Grassley supporting the Fischer Bill also known as SB 3229. As we moved later into 2021 and early 2022, the question on everyone’s mind was where would NCBA land on the policy question and what form of regulation would we pursue as members? So to get some brief context, let’s step back to January of 2021. After going through that summer 2020 marathon meeting and the inception of the 75% plan and watching two Senators from prominent cattle producing states propose government fixes when a market-based proposal was on the table and trying to find it’s sea legs, it became clear that it was going to be a coin toss as to the success of the 75% plan. To try and get ahead of the uncertainty and be well informed and well thought out, CCA formed the price discovery subcommittee in early 2021. Over the past year this group, led by chairman Seth Scribner has held multiple meetings discussing, analyzing, and learning about the complex live cattle pricing system. We had a great cross section of ranching, feeding and ...CONTINUED ON PAGE 10
