United States-The Cattle herd shrinking.

UNITED STATES-CATTLE HERD SHRINKING.

The domestic cattle industry has problems most Americans never hear about, and that’s something that should concern everybody in Belle Fourche and the whole region, ranchers say.

"The domestic cattle herd is shrinking," South Dakota Stockgrowers President Larry Nelson said Feb. 28 at a forum at the Tri-State Expo at the Belle Fourche Area Community Center.

"We have to start thinking about food as a national security item," he added.

Speaking to an audience with ag backgrounds, Nelson’s talk ranged from international trade to concern that the federal government encourages the type of concentrated cattle industry that has overtaken hogs and poultry.

He said there are only about four major genetic lines left in the hog industry producing pork in the U.S. in feeding barns of 1,000 animals owned by major packers.

Making meat animals a standard size makes life easier on packers, he said, "but what if you breed some sort of a genetic problem?"

Environmentalists regularly promote genetic diversity in the wild, and Nelson said that’s important to protecting the food supply too.

Concentration of the nation’s food supply in both location and genetics also makes the nation increasingly exposed to bioterrorism and natural disaster, Nelson said.

The European Union already has taken steps to encourage diversity in Europe.

"There are some added costs to this system, but it is safer and more reliable," he said.

He added that European governments also recognize that farmers take care of the countryside.

Overall, he said, keeping agriculture in the hands of family farmers and ranchers is good for the consuming public.

That message is beginning to be heard by consumer associations in the U.S., Nelson said. Their participation in policymaking may be important for area ranchers.

It’s also important for all of rural South Dakota, he said.

Foreign cattle are feeding the U.S. consumer with about 17 percent of beef sold -- and yet Nelson said this year he got $70 to $124 a head more for his beef cattle sales than a year before.

"For this year, everybody is getting through, but next year with $500 to $550 calves, we’re in trouble," Nelson said.

"I spend a lot of money in Belle Fourche," he said, adding that a beef market tumble and rising costs will mean less money spent by ranchers.

"This is as serious as anything we have looked at since the 1930s," he said.

Nelson said country of origin labeling is vital for American consumers but is opposed by packers. In 2008, he said, more than 700,000 Mexican and 1.5 million Canadian cattle were brought into the U.S.

But packers are labeling beef with a "mixed" label since U.S. and Canadian livestock tend to get processed together.

He also blamed the mixing of U.S. and Canadian cattle for loss of export markets when animals traced back to Canada came down with BSE, or "mad cow" disease.

"I believe that even people of modest means would choose to buy an American product," he said. That’s the choice that country of origin labeling was designed to offer.

Pointing to food and other exports from China that were found with toxic materials, Nelson said people need the labeling to know where their food comes from.

"We are not the low-cost producer," Nelson said, "but we are the safest and most reliable in the world."