I was reading the Saturday edition of the Wall Street Journal last week, and a full-page ad caught my eye in a big way: a full-page ad promoting the sustainability and nutritional value of the U.S. beef cattle industry. This may be the boldest use of Beef Checkoff dollars I’ve ever seen.
NCBA announced at their convention a couple weeks ago that the cattle industry would be carbon neutral by 2040. It seemed like they were just hopping on the bandwagon since every major company in America is making the same claims: Cargill, JBS, etc. Then I thought, “How are they going to do this?”
Methane is the big culprit in this project, and there is plenty of research going on with methane reduction that they think is very achievable; seaweed shows hope. Then there are the other environmental benefits from grazing, like sequestering carbon, increasing healthy soils and reducing wildfire risks by removing fine fuels from forested areas, and the list goes on.
They will measure methane emissions using a testing protocol called GWP*, which measures methane levels relative to CO2 levels and other gases—this is stuff that is way over my head. But it is the industry standard, and it appears that with the use of this measurement tool, we can achieve carbon neutrality by 2040. We at least have a benchmark.
Anyway, NCBA really has its act together on this sustainability issue. They have developed the tools and information to defend the cattle industry. They have developed a powerful media campaign using both print and digital editions of Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and the New York Times—imagine that, perhaps the political epicenter of the world. They had the back page of the Washington Post, Section A, on Aug. 14/15.
Apparently NCBA is loading up for a United Nations (U.N.) conference on sustainable food systems this September. I don’t know what you think of the U.N., but in my opinion, they create more problems than they solve. This is the largest collection of ideologists in the world—this is the presumed political elites that are going to make your life better. It appears to me that the U.N. participants want to even out the playing field around the world. They mention the redistribution of resources for a more equitable world, AKA, your money through taxation. Almost sounds like communism.
Now I can see why NCBA is loading up their sustainability toolbox because when the U.N. speaks, everyone shudders in fear of what crazy ideals they will come up with. So, rest assured that NCBA has your back on this one. Now, I have a better understanding on why they were charter members for the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef.
This may be one of the best media campaigns for the beef industry, and it’s certainly one of the most important. These media campaigns have a real impact on decision and policymakers worldwide. I went to the Western Video Market’s Cheyenne Sale last week and showed the ad around to cattlemen, and they all approved. I talked to Colin Woodall at NCBA, and he said the initial responses were positive. He said folks were spending 4-8 minutes on their website viewing sustainability material.
By the way, the ad’s headline was “BEEFING UP SUSTAINABILITY, if all livestock producers were eliminated and every American followed a vegan diet, greenhouse gas emissions would only be reduced by 2 percent, or 0.36 percent globally.” The only thing I didn’t like was the cow in the photo, but the ad had the symbol for renewable energy, a windmill.
Climate change and the pandemic appear to have motivated some groups like the U.N. to impose transformative change to society. If you go and look at the website for the Food Systems Summit, you will quickly learn their motivations are more than just feeding the world and reducing food waste.
The cattle industry has a good story about producing high-quality protein and being sustainable. As we all know, any centennial ranch is sustainable. But when you add up all the environmental benefits of cow-calf production and offset it with the negatives, we have already earned our rightful place in the food chain.
At the end of the day, we’ll let consumers be the judge about the beef industry’s place in an ideological world. Again, we’ll keep praying for western rains. — PETE CROW
