Northwest Iowa — This May, like every May, is Beef Month. But this May there are some added concerns for both consumers and producers.
Kent Pruisman of Rock Valley is the Iowa Beef Industry Council Vice-Chair. He’s also on the Iowa State Beef Checkoff Program Executive Committee. He tells us that the higher prices people are seeing for beef in the grocery store do not mean there is a beef shortage.
(as said:) “There’s not a shortage of beef. There’s a shortage of processing capacity to get the beef to the grocery store. The COVID-19 virus is having a big impact in processing plants all across the country as a result of absenteeism and employees not able to go to work, that has slowed down the ability of processors to get the product out there. So it’s something we have never experienced before… to this degree anyway, but beef is you know, the price that I think we see at the grocery stores today is not something we’re going to see long-term. Eventually we get this back, you know where the processors are processing the amount of cattle that they were prior to the virus. I think that all works itself through the system.”
He tells us people should keep buying and eating beef.
(as said:) “We got a great product and very nutritious. It’s just we’re all dealing with something today that we’ve — in my lifetime anyway — I’ve never seen anything like or experienced anything like it.”
Pruisman tells us that while beef is a little more expensive in the store, it’s not the farmers who are benefiting from that. It’s supply and demand. He says, unfortunately, the only solution for most of us is to wait until packing plants ramp-up to full capacity again. He says local butchers can help, but most of them are booked until the end of the year, and there are already about a million cattle backing up the system, and as well as the butchers do, they couldn’t handle that many animals that are ready to go right now.
Pruisman says the Beef Checkoff people are doing all they can to promote beef, and promote it in a little different way. He says with people staying home, that message has had to change a little.
(as said:) “One of the issues that the industry has had to deal with is the processors had to change their product lines from packaging for restaurants and hotel trade to more of it going to grocery stores. And that’s just another one of the things that you know, we ran into — the industry did — going through this.”
He tells beef producers that this too, shall pass.
(as said:) “It’s a tough go for everybody right now and it’s not just the cattle people. It’s agriculture in general. The hog guys are having it. The cattle guys are having it. The row-crop guys don’t have room to price… I mean it’s just everything is pretty dismal right now. But you know, we’ve, I guess, been through things like this before and we’ll get through this one too eventually.”
For beef recipes, you can go to beefitswhatsfordinner.com/recipes.
