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Nebraska Cattlemen President wants more processing options for producers
The Nebraska Cattlemen’s president says there’s still more to be done to improve price discovery in the cattle market.
Bill Rhea tells Brownfield they’ve been working with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association to set regional minimums for cash trade levels. “We’re kind of a quarter into that. We’re working on the second quarter numbers now,” Rhea says.
Rhea says increasing processing capacity makes the market more competitive. “Hopefully along the way, we’ll find some more things that we can do to help producers and maintain producers, so we get through where we have enough hook space,” he says.
He says parts of the industry are still recovering from supply chain disruptions brought on by the coronavirus pandemic. “We’re looking at comparable numbers last year that were down 30-40-50 percent on processing on the major plants and we had to find a way to move meat through the system.”
Rhea says more work needs to be done to help local processors meet increased demand.
