The North American Meat Institute (NAMI) responded to the New York Times’ (NYT) “The Daily” podcast examining the beef and cattle markets, calling it “simply wrong.”
NAMI disputed that only packers have a role in determining price and said there are many steps in the supply chain. “The podcast leads the listener to believe that beef industry consolidation is increasing when it has had the same four-firm ratio for nearly 30 years,” NAMI said in a statement.
NAMI stated the podcast “narrowed its focus to the struggles of one moment in a global pandemic and ignored that since the summer of 2021, prices for cattle producers have rebounded.”
NAMI pointed out that cattle producers are earning the highest prices for their animals since 2014, the previous highest year on record. NAMI noted that agricultural economists have predicted that the markets behaved predictably given the black swan events of the past couple of years.
“The laws of supply and demand apply to packers as well as producers,” NAMI said in a statement. “While we cannot predict the future, we can learn from the past.”
