Exports Add Value to Every Head of Cattle Produced in the U.S

By Laura Handke

“There’s so much going on in the world today,” U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) economist Erin Borror told viewers of a recent University of Nebraska – Lincoln Farm and Ranch Management webinar, “but hopefully, you are familiar with USMEF. The way I have always looked at it (USMEF), for me as a producer, is that we are your boots on the ground around the world, marketing U.S. beef and pork, and understanding what’s driving (international) consumers and policy.”

Today, the U.S. is the largest beef exporter on a monetary basis and only follows Brazil in volume. Impressive, considering the slowed pace of beef exports to China in comparison to 2020. A fact Borror says is driven by the strong demand for U.S. beef and pork, both domestically and abroad, with exports climbing 10% in 2021, alone.

“If you exclude what happened last year with our plant disruptions,” she says, “and at the same time we’ve been producing more beef and more fed beef than we did not only last year, but also compared to 2019. What we are seeing is not a result of a supply issue; it’s red-hot demand driving this (beef) market.”

U.S. beef exports are expected to remain record-setting strong through 2021, even with major shipping delays and logistical challenges.

“It’s hard to imagine just how big our exports would be this year if we didn’t have these logistical hurdles,” Borror says. Demand Drivers

With a stable U.S. beef and pork consumption demand, exports have been underpinning the growth in U.S. beef and pork production for the past five years, helping each sector to grow production around 15% during that time. During the same time, exports of pork increased by 39% and beef exports increased by 18%.

“Larger exports have offset larger production,” Borror says. “We’ll set another record this year after a bit of a slow down last year. We’ll dominate Japan again on grain fed, same for Hong Kong and same for Taiwan.”

Helping to drive grain fed exports, aside from COVID-19 rebound and a growing middle class, is the decline in Australian beef exports.

“Australia is showing slaughter the lowest in 36 years at 6.4 million head, down 11% from last year. That’s a decrease of 2 million head from 2019 and if we look ahead, slaughter is not expected to exceed 7 million head and they aren’t projected to hit that until 2023,” Borror says of the positive U.S. beef export window that is projected to last through 2022 and possibly even into 2023. FF