Running Scared

Can you guess who is running scared from <acronym title="Country of Origin Labeling">COOL</acronym>? The big Meat packers, <acronym title="National Cattlemans Beef Association, shills for the big meat packers">NCBA</acronym>, good guess but wrong. <br />n<br />n<blockquote>And industry officials say they're ready to put up a fight.</blockquote><br />n<br />nWow, they are really going to fight this. Who is this industry that is so opposed to this? <a href="http://www.cattlenetwork.com/content.asp?contentid=110471">Canada's cattle and hog industries</a>, that's who.<br />n<br />nWhat, they aren't proud of their product? Don't want to see product of Canada on beef or pork sold in the US? These aren't the reason's for their opposition. Here's the reason.<br />n<br />n<blockquote>we also stand to be injured greatly because we don't have normalized access to key markets in Asia at this time.</blockquote><br />n<br />nWe now see the problem. With all the <acronym title="Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy">BSE</acronym> problems they have had the Asian markets don't want their beef so to market it they ship the live critter to the US, have it slaughtered and then ship it to the Asian markets. Pretty darn sneaky but we knew that was going on all along. So do the Asian markets, they just turn a blind eye to it, that way they can tell their people they are protecting them from <acronym title="Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy">BSE</acronym> from Canada while maintaining good relations with North America. Win/win all the way around for Canada and the Asian markets. Somewhere in here American cattle producers seem to lose out but the US government doesn't care about that.<br />n<br />nOne thing I have to agree with is this article is the very last sentence.<br />n<br />n<blockquote>"These U.S. outlets do not view this program as a demand-enhancing tool, but rather one that will increase cost," Haney said. "This means that the cost will eventually be transferred back down to U.S. cattle producers."</blockquote><br />n<br />nAll I see is how <acronym title="Country of Origin Labeling">COOL</acronym> will cost me money in the long run. I don't think the majority of consumers in the US care about where there beef comes from. It's a commodity item that they will pay the cheapest price for. Also consumers don't buy a lot of beef at the store counters anymore. It's all sold in the restaurants and food service industry and people don't care where their beef comes from when they are in a restaurant. Taste and especially price are all they care about. I know there will be people that disagree with these statements out there but I said the majority of people want these things, not the discerning people like those that read this blog that want good tasting beef. To them it would matter, but not to most.<br />n<br />nThe extra cost I am worried about? The ridiculous requirements the <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> has dreamed up to hamper the implementation of <acronym title="Country of Origin Labeling">COOL</acronym>. If I remember right one of them is all US beef has to traced and tracked and all foreign beef is free to move through the system with out being kept track of. That's ridiculous but will cost me money. Why they can't just track all foreign beef and any that makes it to the package is then labeled that way, otherwise it's American. That makes much more sense but the <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> wants COL to fail and they set up the rules so it would. Hopefully Congress looks into this and fixes it.<br />n<br />n<strong>He who thinks and thinks for himself, will always have a claim to thanks; it is no matter whether it be right or wrong, so as it be explicit. If it is right, it will serve as a guide to direct; if wrong, as a beacon to warn. Jeremy Bentham</strong>