Lions Club hosts Burkham from Beef Alliance at weekly meeting
The Malvern Lions Club welcomed Jessica Burkham to speak at their weekly meeting Tuesday afternoon at the First Baptist Church Family Life Center.
Burkham is the Managing Director of the Beef Alliance organization, a unified group of cattle feeding companies that pushes for research, legislation and practices that “drive positive change while enhancing transparency and stewardship in order to ensure a sustainable cattle feeding segment,” as stated on their website.
“Individually, Beef Alliance members are recognized as progressive and innovative leaders in the U.S. cattle feeding segment. Together, as a unified organization representing approximately 25 percent of the fed cattle supply, the Beef Alliance is committed to continuously improve the way we care for our cattle,” according to the website.
Burkham is a Nebraska native who grew up on an Registered Angus beef cattle ranch and showed livestock all around the country through her youth participation in 4H and FFA programs. She earned a degree in Animal Science at the Univ. of Nebraska and worked in Washington, D.C. on legislation pertaining to the beef industry. She moved to Arkansas after meeting her now-husband, Cody Burkham, who is current Executive Vice-president of the Arkansas Cattlemen’s Association.
According to the Arkansas Beef Council, the state boasts nearly 2 million head of cattle on over 5 million acres. “Beef cattle production contributes nearly $500 million to Arkansas’ economy each year, as well as providing employment opportunities in rural communities across the state.” And Burkham pointed out that the demand for beef is stronger than ever, ensuring that Arkansas cattle ranchers will continue to be an important part of the global food chain.
The Beef Alliance focuses on research, legislation, industrial development, sustainability, collaboration and safe practices for the cattle feeding industry.
“This organization formed in 2015 by these progressive cattle feeders who wanted to address consumer concerns,” Burkham said, noting that at the time, public concern was growing about excessive antibiotic usage in beef.
“They wanted to figure out how they could reduce the number of, or the amount of antibiotics they were using in their feed yards, without jeopardizing the health and safety of that animal, we want to do it in a scientific manner,” she said.
Each member group has lab facilities within their operations, and they partner with nutritionists, veterinarians, scientists and scholars to conduct research that will ensure better production and healthy cattle.
“In addition, the Beef Alliance is a founding member of the International Consortium for Antimicrobial Stewardship in Agriculture (ICASA), a public-private partnership that aims to conduct research to promote the judicious use of antibiotics, advance animal health and welfare, and increase transparency in food production practices,” as stated on their website. “Membership in ICASA will be another opportunity to collaborate with industry partners on critical issues that impact our ability to raise healthy animals.”
“We also focus on innovation,” Burkham said. “We have, for the last two years, hosted what I like to call the ‘Shark Tank’ for cattle feeders.”
During the organization’s annual Startup Challenge, startup companies are invited to pitch innovative ideas about addressing common problems in the industry. They are especially interested in solutions pertaining to reducing greenhouse gases, im
proving operational efficiency, and maintaining animal health and welfare.
“The winner receives a $50,000 reward and has an opportunity to do a pilot program with a Beef Alliance member company,” Burkham said.
“Rather than waiting for solutions to support cattle feeding to come forward, the Beef Alliance is seeking to support, encourage and drive innovation to help ensure a sustainable cattle feeding segment,” according to the organization’s website. “The Beef Alliance Startup Challenge is a one-of-a-kind opportunity for the creators of technology (startups) to engage directly with the customers of technology (feedyards) to put high impact solutions to work.”
The Beef Alliance also focuses a lot of energy and attention on policy and legislation that affects the beef industry.
“There’s been a lot of legislation that was introduced in response to COVID-19 that would mandate how cattle feeders market our cattle, and that’s not OK with us,” Burkham said. “We do not want the government telling us what to do, we know what’s best for our kind of market.”
Beef Alliance members and staff work closely with politicians and lawmakers to address what they see as harmful and overreaching legislation. They’ve worked to establish state meat inspections, worked on increasing broadband access for rural ranchers, helped expand the Lemon Law to include Class 1, 1-ton vehicles, and helped ensure equity and fairness in applicable taxes, among other initiatives.
The Beef Alliance had a heavy hand in instituting a state meat inspection program in Arkansas in October of last year, making it one of 29 states now participating in the State Meat and Poultry Inspection (MPI) program.
Under an agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), states must enforce requirements “at least equal to” the federal guidelines, but the alternative arrangement seeks to circumvent supply chain issues and help small meat processing companies “in building their local and state marketplaces,” said Sandra Eskin, USDA’S Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety.
“So, you’re not only creating opportunities for your beef producers, but you’re creating opportunities to sell a local Arkansas product to a local Arkansas producer,” Burkham said. Once the state inspection program is solidified, advocates hope to broaden the program into an interstate commerce agreement.
Burkham said the Beef Alliance will keep a close eye on future developments in research and legislation, particularly because the new governor, Sarah Sanders, has voiced interest in doing away with state income taxes.
“That’s really concerning to agriculture because we have a lot of exemptions, and where are they going to get the revenue that they eliminate with the income tax?” Burkham said. “They’re going to get it from ag, or they’re going to increase property taxes, so those are some things we’re keeping an eye on.”
Burkham commended Sanders “for trying to keep an open mind about this, but those exceptions are really important to keep costs down, especially as we’re in this current economic environment of inflation and increased input costs, fighting a drought, all these things that are just compounding our small beef cattle producers, and we want to be mindful of not adding additional problems to them.”
The Beef Alliance will also address changes they see that need to be made to the current fencing laws. “We have some pretty antiquated fencing laws in this state, as well. They’re very convoluted, and there’s a lot of uncertainty about whose job it is to keep what animals where.”
Burkham said we also need to expand access to veterinary medicine and watch what’s called the cattle contract library. “This is one of those intrusive policies that passed as an appropriations rider for the 2022 Omnibus Bill,” she said.
“All of my members operate with alternative marketing arrangements, that is, private business-to-business arrangements between them and their packer, and this library would want to publish some of that information, and we feel that that is completely intrusive and inappropriate and jeopardizes our ability to market our cattle,” she said.
This year is the five-year mark on new Farm Bill legislation to be slated, and Beef Alliance members are confident that John Boozman, ranking member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry. will work in the best interest of the state, and the industry, to make sure farm programs are well-represented in legislation. The Farm Bill will adrdress critical aspects of the industry such as commodities, conservation, trade, and crop insurance.
Other legislation, like a law that would mandate cash minimums for the sale of cattle, are opposed by the Beef Alliance, because they believe that the market should determine the fair price. They are also concerned with labor and immigration because the industry depends heavily on Hispanic labor.
“We want to make sure immigration laws are upheld, but we also want to be sure that we can get the folks that we need, who want to come here legally and want to do it right and want to provide for their families, that we allow them to do so,” Burkham said.
Despite all the issues associated with raising cattle, the demand for beef remains high and the money is there, although profit margins get slimmer and slimmer with the rising costs of operations. For more information about Beef Alliance, visit beefalliance. com. And for more about the beef industry in Arkansas, call 501-225-1598 or visit the Ark. Dept. of Agriculture’s website at www.agriculture. arkansas.gov.