WASHINGTON - The United State's largest cattlemen's group has decided not to support petitions filed by a grass roots rancher organization calling for an investigation into cattle imports from Canada and Mexico.
The decision by the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) appears to be a major blow to the cases brought by the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Foundation (R-CALF), since that group has hoped to establish legal standing by demonstrating that at least 25 percent of the industry supports its view.
Without the backing of NCBA, the Commerce Department may have to conduct a statistical poll of livestock producers to determined the issue of legal standing, Terence Stewart, outside counsel for R-CALF, has said.
R-CALF filed three separate petitions asking for U.S. government trade investigations. Two were against Canada and one was against Mexico.
The NCBA Executive Committee discussed all three in a meeting on Tuesday, but only voted on R-CALF's petition for a countervailing duty investigation against Canada.
By a vote of 9-5, the NCBA's Executive Committee decided not to support that petition. No vote was taken on R-CALF's petitions for an anti-dumping investigation against Canada and Mexico, which an NCBA spokesman said could be interpreted as the group's lack of support for those items as well.
“We do not see the merit in the R-CALF request at this time when the risks and costs (of the investigation) are so high,” NCBA International Markets Committee Chairman Dana Hauck said in a statement. “We feel aggressive efforts already under way are the best alternative to resolve the issues and to maintain good relations with important trading partners.”
U.S. and Canadian officials have already begun talks aimed at easing agricultural trade frictions, including some affecting cattle and beef trade. Hauck expressed hope that those talks would bear fruit, and also noted that Canada recently has implemented revised rules that make it easier for U.S. cattlemen to ship feeder cattle to Canada.
Legal experts advised the NCBA that filing anti-dumping and countervailing duty cases would likely cost more than $1 million each, take seven to 14 months to resolve and have less than a 50 percent chance of success.
“We feel ongoing efforts to resolve these issues bilaterally... must be fully exhausted before employing multi-year, multimillion lawsuits,” said NCBA President-elect George Swan.
The NCBA will host a U.S.-Canada cattle trade summit in Denver next Monday. That meeting will include cattle industry representatives from both countries, as well as federal, state and provincial officials from the United States and Canada.
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