New NCBA chief visits WCA winter conference

The newly named president of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, J.D. Alexander believes the beef industry has a host of important issues facing it, and came to Wisconsin to talk about them to members of the Wisconsin Cattlemen's Association at their winter conference Friday (Feb. 10.)

Alexander is from Pilger, NE, which is in the northeast part of the state, where he runs a cattle feeding and finishing operation with a 5,000-head feedlot along with a 2,000-acre farming operation.

He's the third generation in the family business and his son is already working his way into the business.

The new NCBA president has a platter full of things to work on in Washington. "When government can't legislate they regulate," he said, and the organization is working to counter some of the things it doesn't agree with.

"We've seen too many unreasonable regulations in recent years, like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) attempting to regulate dust on farms or the Department of Transportation attempting to require farmers to have commercial drivers' licenses."

Alexander believes the U.S. Department of Agriculture's proposed changes to the rules at the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) went way too far as did the Department of Labor's proposals to keep children from working on farms and ranches.

"That one just hit us. That's our livelihood, our future."

An agency of the USDA, GIPSA is in charge of the rules governing the marketing of livestock, poultry, meat, cereal grains, oil seeds and related agricultural products. It's mandate is to promote fair and competitive trading practices for the overall benefit of consumers and American agriculture.

The agency, now called GIPSA, was formed in 1994 through the joining of the Federal Grain Inspection Service and the Packers and Stockyards Administration. Proposed rule changes at the agency have been controversial - with groups like NCBA opposing the changes and groups including the National Farmers Union endorsing them.

The NCBA is also opposed to an increase in estate taxes that may occur by default this year. Under federal law the limit on estate taxes reverts to a $1 million exemption and a tax rate of 55 percent above that limit, Alexander said.

"Our industry takes great pride in the rural way of life and that way of life has to be open to the next generation."

The movement of people from rural to urban areas continues, Alexander said, and organizations like his have to make sure that there's a way for the next generation to live and work in rural America.

The new president has worked his way up through the officer chain at NCBA, first serving as vice president, then president-elect and now president. "It's a very good learning process."

Alexander said that the NCBA is a great organization doing policy work in Washington as well as contracting with the Beef Board on promotion efforts.

"It's a producer organization; the one our 25,000 members look to for leadership on these issues. We need to hire the right people and do the work of our industry."

The Nebraska cattleman looks at his new job as being a spokesperson for the industry and a connection point for the affiliated state organizations.

"We are teammates on issues of importance to the nation and the world," he said.

The national organization, along with the qualified state beef boards, carries out a variety of projects to increase the demand for beef.

The Cattlemen's Beef Board is charged with handling the money collected from the $1-per-head beef checkoff and manages the money collected, he explained. There are 45 state beef councils that have the option to use half of that money for their projects.

The federation of those 45 councils coordinates ideas and the states decide how much of the promotion and advertising they want to fund through the national program, he said.

"I'm from Nebraska and we have far more cattle than people there but we collect a lot of checkoff dollars so we decided to put our money where the people are and use it through the federation."