Guest Column: State Beef Referendum Coming in 2014

Originally published in the Dec. 11, 2013, issue

 

CALLAWAY

Now is the time for all cattle producers in Georgia to make your voice heard! You have until Dec. 31 to request a ballot to vote in the beef referendum that will be held in early 2014. In case you are unaware of what is happening with regards to the referendum, I would like to give you a brief summary of how this all came about.

The Georgia Farm Bureau Beef Commodity Committee was meeting in August 2011. During the meeting the need for more dollars for valuable research and product promotion was discussed.  After much conversation it was suggested that a study committee of stakeholders be formed to look at a producer investment program. The idea was put into official policy and passed by the general membership at the annual meeting at Jekyll Island.

Fast forward about four months and a similar policy was passed by Georgia Cattlemen’sAssociation at their annual meeting at the Beef Expo in Perry during April 2012. It was just a matter of time before the Georgia Milk Producers and the Georgia Livestock Marketing Association came on board also. Three people from each organization were appointed to a 12-member study committee. 

The study committee met through the summer and fall at various locations throughout the state. In the end it was unanimous among the committee that a referendum be held and let the producers decide if they wanted a state beef checkoff.

This checkoff should not be confused with the National Beef Checkoff that has been law since 1986. The national Checkoff of $1 per head can be spent only for promotion, research or education. Fifty cents of every dollar collected is administered by the Cattlemen’s Beef Board at the national level. The other 50 cents of every dollar is returned to the state where it is collected and here in Georgia is administered by the Georgia Beef Board. Both the state and national boards are comprised of beef farmers, ranchers, dairymen and livestock market operators.

Meetings were held with the commissioner of agriculture and other key members of the Department of Agriculture. They were supportive and offered their help in any way. After much work by all involved, Senate Bill 97 was introduced in the 2013 legislative session of the General Assembly. The bill, passed and signed into law by the governor, called for a referendum to be held with all Georgia cattle producers eligible to vote their wishes as to whether or not to fund the Georgia Agricultural Commodity Commission for Beef. Anyone in Georgia who owned cattle in the last 12 months is eligible to vote. Ballots will be mailed sometime after the first of the year.

If passed, the Agriculture Commodity Commission for Beef would be run by cattlemen. This five-member producer board would determine how the funds would be spent. The commission must also be reaffirmed every three years by a vote of all cattle producers in the state.

The original legislation that created the foundation for commodity commissions in Georgia was passed in 1961. There are 12 other such commodity commissions in our state, all of which are administered by the Department for a nominal fee of less than 5 percent of the dollars collected. 

If the state beef checkoff assessment of up to $1 per head passes, it could in essence triple the amount of money that could be spent in our state to support the beef industry with funds for promotion or advertising, vital research or education of our consumers and health professionals about the value of beef in a healthy diet. 

With a 10 million-plus population, we only generate three cents per Georgian through the national Checkoff. According to a study at the University of Florida, researchers found that for every $1 invested in the national Checkoff, cattlemen receive a $5.50 return. I don’t know of anything else that even comes close to that.

Cattleman John Callaway is the chairman of the Georgia Cattle Industry Investment Study Group and Georgia Farm Bureau’s Beef Commodity Board. To register for the Agricultural Commodity Commission for Beef referendum ballot, visit www.agr.georgia.gov or write to the Department at: Georgia Department of Agriculture, Marketing Division, Room 324, 19 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive Southwest, Atlanta, GA 30334. Written requests for ballots should include your name, phone number and the phrase “I request a ballot for the ACC Beef referendum.”