Minnesota Farmers Union

(March 28, 2010) - Of all the political hot rocks farm groups are juggling now in Washington, D.C.-cap-and-trade, cuts in crop insurance, shrinking farm program budgets-I'll bet you a cup of coffee you cannot name the issue that recently united ag heavyweights as diverse as the American Farm Bureau and National Farmers Union.

That issue (cream and sugar, please) is the proposed changes in governance at the National Cattlemen's Beef Association that will give it a virtual lock on the tens of millions of dollars spent each year by the mandatory beef checkoff.

The move didn't go unnoticed by several farm groups. On March 18 they sent a toughly-worded, four-page letter to Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack that suggested NCBA's grab "will further erode the separation between the check-off side and the policy side" and "will move the checkoff towards more exclusivity rather than inclusivity."

What that means west of the Potomac, explains Nancy Robinson, vice president of government and industry affairs at the Livestock Marketing Association, is that checkoff- paying producers who are not members of NCBA-and 32 out of every 33 American cattle owners are not-need to be heard in checkoff issues.