Supporting Independent
Family Farm Livestock
Production Since 1985
We need to let the MO Department of Ag know that we are opposed to this new
state beef checkoff and the referendum. The Missouri Department of Ag should
stop the referendum now.
Missouri Beef Checkoff Facts

Last year the legislature passed a state law to allow an additional state beef checkoff tax to be charged to
beef producers on top of the $2 million each year we already pay in federal checkoff fees. Now, Missouri
beef producers are faced with paying a potential $4.5 million each year in checkoff fees.

Hundreds of cattle producers from across the state responded with a resounding NO to the new beef
checkoff tax proposal but legislators in Jefferson City and Governor Nixon sided with the pro-checkoff
lobbyists and passed and signed a new law allowing for a referendum for a state beef check-off tax.

Since the 1980’s, Missouri cattle producers have been paying over $2 million per year into an obsolete,
outdated program that has yielded disastrously poor results. Since 1985, when the beef checkoff was
passed by Congress, beef consumption has plummeted 31% nationally and Missouri has lost 40% of its
cattle producers. This has not been a successful program for Missouri cattle producers. And now the
Missouri Beef Industry Council (MBIC) is asking for a 200% raise.

We believe the law passed by the legislature is unconstitutional because it forces producers to provide three
years of cattle sale numbers just in order to register to vote in the referendum and we have no way of
knowing if this proprietary information will be made public.

The vast majority of check-off dollars currently being paid ends up in the coffers of the National
Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) who consistently supports policies that favor corporate meatpackers
(even foreign-owned meatpackers) at the expense of Missouri’s independent cattle producers. The NCBA
adamantly opposes Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) which allows U.S. consumers to choose U.S. beef,
and they support corporate packer ownership of livestock which drives down producer farm-gate prices.

The Missouri Beef Industry Council ignored its own hand-picked “Missouri Beef Checkoff Taskforce” that
voted to request a $.50 per head state checkoff instead of $1 on August 26th and instead the MBIC
requested $1/head anyway. Another clear example of the no accountability attitude of the Missouri Beef
Industry Council.

Beef producers should not be forced to pour their hard earned money into this totally unaccountable
government program instead of investing that money in our own operations and local economies.

If this checkoff goes into place, the Missouri Beef Industry Council will start getting beef producers’
money on July 1st, 2016.

The Missouri Department of Agriculture has refused to hold a public rulemaking and comment process
because they are in a hurry to start collecting checkoff dollars by July. They want to make all of the rules
behind closed doors, instead of using the required public rulemaking process. This is government
bureaucracy at its worst.
Over

The Missouri Department of Agriculture is proposing a non-secret ballot in which producers’ right to
privacy will be violated by having to put their name next to their vote. This is unconstitutional, a
violation of our rights and not how the democratic process works.

As of August 26th, the Missouri Beef Industry Council reported that they have $700,000 of beef
producer’s money in their reserve.

The MDA held only one hearing on this referendum and is not accepting any written testimony or input
from Missouri beef producers who were unable to attend the hearing, even though Missouri has 50,000
beef producers all across the state.

The last time MDA held a referendum, no producers showed up at the public hearing, only 4% of
producers voted and 2.8% of producers voted in favor of raising the corn checkoff that forced 100% of
Missouri’s corn producers to pay the doubled checkoff fee. In contrast, when USDA held a Pork
Checkoff referendum, which did include a public rulemaking process and a secret ballot, 48% of
Missouri hog producers voted and 64% voted to end the pork checkoff.

Supporters of this unnecessary checkoff also claim that there will be some way to get a refund after the
fact, so they try to call this a “voluntary” program. In reality, cattle producers are forced to pay into this
program by having the money taken out of their checks before they even get them. If the fee is not paid
when due, a penalty shall apply and the attorney general can sue cattle producers for the collection of
checkoff fees and penalties. It doesn’t get any more MANDATORY than that.

There is no sunset clause on this beef checkoff. Once these programs are put into place, they are
virtually impossible to get rid of. So, as cattle prices continue to decline, producers will still be paying
the extra $2 million+ every year.

There are no rules that this checkoff slush fund will be used to promote Missouri beef. The Missouri
Cattlemen’s Association successfully lobbied to remove “the promote Missouri beef language” from the
draft bill. And, our federal checkoff dollars are already being used to promote foreign beef in U.S.
markets.
For more information about the proposed state beef checkoff, contact
the Missouri Rural Crisis Center at (573) 449-1336.