Executive Edge

Josh St. Peters, Illinois Beef Association Executive Vice President

It is hard to believe how quickly we are rolling through July. Summer months are filled with some of the longest days of the year, but it seems to me that the weeks sure fly by quickly given all the activities this season brings on a cattle operation. For the association staff and leaders, it is also the final stretch of planning and organizing ahead of the state fairs in Springfield and DuQuoin. I am excited for the many great events we have planned, and I do hope you are able to join us for at least some of the festivities.

One highlight of the Illinois State Fair in Springfield is our Ribeye Corral at the Commodities Pavilion, across from the Grandstand. This venue gives us a chance to engage with thousands of consumers during the 11-days of the fair and provides the opportunity to serve up quality beef products to feed the fairgoers and exhibitors. But we cannot make this food stand a success without member participation, and volunteers are still needed. Please drop me an e-mail or call the office if you are willing to help for a shift during the fair. I promise we will keep it fun, and you will likely have the chance to make some new friends.

I have enjoyed the chance already this summer to meet and make friends with many producers across the state. Thank you to the affiliate organizations and local groups who have hosted me for county dinners, beef promotions at county fairs and for farm visits with several of you. I appreciate connecting names and faces, and really value the conversations with our local members throughout Illinois.

It is evident to me that our industry, and this organization, has a lot to celebrate including the many new faces we have welcomed into IBA so far in 2021. Our organization has added nearly 500 new members this year, for example. And as we have been able to hold public events again, many new people have turned out to participate for the first time in BQA workshops, at our recent IBA Summer Conference and at local affiliate meetings. It is encouraging and inspiring to see the growth in our industry. In recent weeks, several state breed organizations have had delegations of Illinois families traveling across the country for regional and national junior cattle shows, and I have heard consistently about newcomers participating in those great youth programs as well.

We recently completed elections of new leaders during our Annual Meeting held in East Peoria. Congratulations to Dr. Paul Walker and Dave Duzan, who are now serving as our President and Vice President, respectively. We have also welcomed several new faces onto the Board of Governors, including Wes Hornback of Monticello, Cody Lowderman of Macomb, Jamie Martz of Maple Park and Kevin Rose of Salem. These newly elected leaders, along with our continuing Directors, make up a tremendous group of leaders who are advocating on behalf of you and your operation, and I am grateful for their volunteerism.

Another aspect of this busy summer season for me personally is the political functions and meetings with our elected officials within the General Assembly. It is another arena where there are many new faces, given how many of our State Representatives and State Senators are new to Springfield this year. Unfortunately, only a few of them come from backgrounds where they know firsthand about beef production and agriculture in general. This creates a significant opportunity to connect with these leaders to share the story of our industry and our organization. I am always looking for members and beef producing families willing to help with our political engagements across the state; if you are interested in helping promote IBA’s mission to your elected officials, please reach out to the IBA office and let me know.

We are quickly approaching the 2021 Cattle Industry Convention in Nashville, Tenn. NCBA has put together a stellar lineup of meetings and trade show exhibits this year, on August 10-12, at the Opryland Resort and Convention Center. While I won’t be able to attend in person this year (due to IBA commitments at the Illinois State Fair in Springfield), we have a great delegation of our leaders and staff making the trip to represent IBA. Policy debate at this year’s meeting will certainly center around several critical topics at the national level, including proposed legislation on cattle market transparency and price discovery, as well as federal tax policies being proposed by the Biden Administration. We will have more information from the NCBA meeting in next month’s Illinois Beef magazine, and in the meantime via e-mail updates and online from our staff in Springfield.

Specific to policy topics, we have completed the member survey on cattle market transparency in the last few days. Hundreds of beef producers from across the state provided their input, and our Policy Division of the IBA Board of Governors is meeting later this month to review the results. Thank you to each of you who took the time to complete the survey and submit your opinions on this important subject. We will be sending out communication to all of you regarding the results, and how the membership input is shaping IBA’s input on national policy debates at the meetings in Tennessee next month.

If you have questions, concerns or need help with an issue on your operation or in your community, please don’t hesitate to reach out. My contact at the office is josh@illinoisbeef.com or (217) 787-4280 and if I am on the road, you can call or text me via (217) 282-0250.