That Cloud On The Horizon

… is a herd of millions of growing spring calves with nowhere to go.
While BSE has slipped from the news cycle in urban areas, the border to the US remains closed to Canadian cattle because of a single case of BSE diagnosed a year and a half ago. A crop of new feeder calves will be heading into a winter with few buyers – there isn’t enough capacity in the Canadian meatpacking industry to process them – much less the cull cattle, which are now virtually worthless.
Nothing is going to change until after the US election cycle – in a close race, nobody is going to rock any boats unneccessarily. If Bush is defeated, don’t look for it to open after the elections either – Kerry’s a “country-of-origin labelling” (translation: clueless about the intricacy of the food industry) protectionist and proud of it.
Yet on the retail front, the prices of beef remain nearly as high as they were before the crisis. While I don’t begrudge the meatpackers and retailers the opportunity to make lemonade out of someone else’s discarded lemons, it isn’t helping to encourage consumption. Margins have always been slim in the cattle industry – and even worthless cattle have to be fed. Something’s going to give. A massive cull is being proposed.
Tomorrow another online petition to open the border comes online. I’m not very optimistic about these campaigns, but if you want to sign on, here’s the link – Opentheborder.com
Can’t hurt, anyway.
(link tip – Charles McDonald, who always has useful observations and good catches, and who should consider starting his own blog.)