Agriculture committee  Not yet, although I suspect it might be somewhat inevitable to the extent that they are not going to realize the price premium in the marketplace, at least not at the magnitude they had hoped for. Ninety per cent of the beef we market in the United States is U.S.-origin beef. It'

Agriculture committee  On behalf of the packers I represent in the United States, I will say they are dissatisfied with the regulation; they're opposed to the mandate. They invested a lot of resources, through their own companies' efforts as well as through the American Meat Institute, to try to oppose

Agriculture committee  Thank you very much. I've been struck by some of the comments by certain producers in Canada that it's costing them x dollars a head, whereas you get feedback from some of the COOL proponents in Washington that it's not the case. As usually turns out to be the case, I think the

Agriculture committee  Yes, it would. As Brian has mentioned on a number of occasions today, the Canadian herd is at a relatively low level, and so too is the U.S. herd. We've been running at 95 million to 100 million, going back over decades. We're at about 90 million right now. There is going to be i

Agriculture committee  Yes, absolutely.

Agriculture committee  We've spent a lot of time talking about decreased value or not a decrease in value, but there certainly has been a decrease in volume, particularly from Canadian hog imports, both the feeder pigs and direct for slaughter. There has been a significant decrease in Mexican feeder ca

Agriculture committee  You're absolutely right. Historically, prior to BSE, the U.S. was the largest beef exporter in the world. Canada was still struggling to recover from that incident six years ago. But conversely, we've historically been the largest beef importer as well. We're a large pork exporte

Agriculture committee  I did make reference to the difficult leverage in dealing with large retailers in the United States when it comes to pricing.

Agriculture committee  Three groups are the leading proponents of COOL in the United States. One would be a group called R-CALF. A second group is the U.S. Cattlemen's Association. The third is a national group, the National Farmers Union.

Agriculture committee  It has certainly imposed an enormous cost on the industry, and I outlined that in my opening remarks, but frankly speaking, those costs are absorbed. They're dispersed. The market responds. In the packing sector, in the middle, we try to operate on margins, at some times more s

Agriculture committee  As Brian Read said, we do have equivalent systems. They're not identical, but our governments recognize them as equivalent for purposes of facilitating trade. Both the Canadian Meat Council and the American Meat Institute are very strong proponents of harmonizing the systems more

Agriculture committee  I'll start on the concept of COOL. It certainly exists. It's both a plus and a minus. It's a plus to the extent that proponents of COOL are dissatisfied with the current regulations and would like to reopen the law and try to get some of the items that Secretary Vilsack has expre

Agriculture committee  Well, in some regard, I think we were partly successful in doing that through the statutory language that was passed by Congress and the regulation that USDA implemented. We were actively engaged in both of those processes. As burdensome and disruptive as COOL has been since it w

Agriculture committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Good morning to you and to the members of the committee. I greatly appreciate the invitation to appear before you here today. My name is Patrick Boyle. I am president and CEO of the American Meat Institute, which is based in Washington, D.C.,