From the CEO
Colin Woodall
During last month’ s announcement of the framework for a trade deal between the United States and the United Kingdom, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins stood next to President Trump in the Oval Office and pronounced American beef was“ the crown jewel of American agriculture.” I should stop writing this article right here because that’ s about as good as it gets. It is reassuring to have a Secretary of Agriculture who believes in us and understands that the role of the secretary is to promote American agriculture and the farmers and ranchers who make it all happen. In just a few short months, Secretary Rollins has demonstrated she has the skills and fortitude to be a strong and effective leader.
Her advocacy was critical to the inclusion of beef in the U. S./ U. K. deal. This bilateral deal has been one of our priorities for many years, but too often progress was thwarted by political hurdles and a lack of trying. The NCBA team has maintained our focus in demonstrating the quality of our product and our production systems to British producers, consumers and government officials, so when the opportunity finally presented itself, we would be ready to pounce. When President Trump announced his plans to use tariffs as a tool to get new or better deals, getting this kind of deal was exactly what he was talking about. Once this deal is done, we will have exponentially more access for U. S. beef in Britain than we’ ve had in the past. Our patience and preparation have resulted in a solid trade win for NCBA.
I believe there will be more lucrative trade deals, especially since news broke as I was writing this article that we have started trade talks with China and the tariffs are going down. Secretary Rollins is doing a great job of being our advocate. In the first meeting I had with her, we focused on the importance of trade to cattle producers. I was thoroughly impressed that she took her own notes. I have never had a meeting with a Cabinet-level official who took their own notes. It was even more impressive when, just two days after our meeting, she participated in a Cabinet meeting that resulted in the president announcing tariffs would not apply to products, such as cattle and beef, included in the U. S.-Mexico- Canada trade agreement. She listens and she acts.
Her skills are now proving useful in leading USDA’ s efforts to help us defend against New World screwworms. You’ ve seen us talk about screwworms since they were discovered in southern Mexico right before Thanksgiving last year. At that time, USDA accelerated their efforts with the Mexican government to hold the line and keep them from coming further north. Due to a lack of cooperation, effective protocols and government bureaucracy,
PROMOTING AND PROTECTING“ THE CROWN JEWEL”
It is reassuring to have a Secretary of Agriculture who believes in us and understands that the role of the secretary is to promote American agriculture and the farmers and ranchers who make it all happen.
the Mexican government was not able to hold the flies back. They are now headed north, and I believe it is no longer a question of whether we get screwworms, it’ s when. This could have been avoided had the Mexican government done their job and listened to advice given by USDA.
Secretary Rollins understood that she needed to take swift and definitive action to get the Mexican government’ s attention, so she decided to close the border. We are standing by the secretary on this decision because we need to do all we can to mitigate this pending pestilence. We hope the Mexican government will step up its action so we can try to slow the screwworm incursion. This will give us more time to get prepared. In the next weeks, you will be seeing resource materials from NCBA on how to identify these pests, who to call, and how to treat your cattle. We haven’ t had to deal with this since the 1960s, so many of us don’ t have experience in what we are about to fight. We must do all we can to protect the health of our cattle, but please remember screwworms can affect wildlife, dogs, people and other warmblooded animals.
Closing the border is not without its consequences, and it is already having an economic impact on us. Many of our members rely on feeder cattle coming out of Mexico. We are already dealing with historically low cattle numbers, so we could see packing plants scale back or possibly shut down. That will have a ripple effect across all segments of cattle and beef production. There are no easy answers to this situation, but we are approaching it by keeping all variables in mind and pushing for a quick resolution to the screwworm scourge.
The only effective way to eradicate New World screwworms is with introduction of sterile males. New World screwworm females only mate once, so the sterile males are the way to stop, control and ultimately eradicate this pest. However, it will take hundreds of millions of sterile flies each week to get this done. We are working with several of our state partner associations to push Secretary Rollins and Congress to build a domestic sterile fly production facility to help us win this war. This will be a war, and it is our cowcalf members in south Texas who are on the initial front lines. The state and national partnership will be critical in providing the help and resources cattle producers need to be prepared.
If you wondered what the next“ black swan” event was going to be for us, this is it. They are flesh-eating larvae that turn into black flies with big red eyes. What they don’ t realize is they are now facing a formidable foe … America’ s cattle producers.
6 JUNE 2025 www. NCBA. org