House delay on beef labeling gets mixed reaction

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By NELSON LAMPE / The Associated Press

OMAHA — Some Nebraska cattle producers are disappointed about another likely delay in requiring labels on beef, while other producers are content to wait for a better law.

"It's amazing that the clothes we wear, we know where they come from. But the food we put in our mouths, we don't know where it comes from," said Chris Abbott, president of the Independent Cattlemen of Nebraska.

He said Thursday that the new group, affiliated with the national R-CALF group, now has upwards of 700 members.

The Nebraska Cattlemen group, however, said Thursday it's happy to wait for a better law. Michael Kelsey, executive vice president, said his 5,000-member group is comfortable with the House of Representatives vote to delay labeling.

On Wednesday the House voted to block the federal government from requiring country-of-origin labels for beef, as called for in the 2002 Farm Bill.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the House Agriculture Committee chairman, said the labels would do the opposite of what was intended and add $10 per head to ranchers' costs. The supermarket and meatpacking industries estimate the labels would cost as much as $4 billion in the first year.

"It will make our producers less competitive with foreign meat producers, not more competitive," said Goodlatte, R-Va.

Nebraskan Abbott disagreed.

"If that were the case, I think us producers would cover some of that cost," Abbott said. "But until we do it we don't really know the cost."

"In order to trade globally, which is where our country is headed," Abbott said, "we have to be able to differentiate our product in order to compete."

The labeling had already been delayed until 2006. Lawmakers Wednesday forbade the Agriculture Department from spending money on the new labeling requirement pushing it back again.

The National Farmers Union objected to further delay.

"This law has been on the books for three years," said the group's president, Dave Frederickson in a statement. "How much more time do they need?"

Public Citizen, a national, nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, also decried the House vote.

"Without mandatory meat labeling, consumers have no way to differentiate between foreign and domestic meat, information that is vital in the face of increasing food imports and continued food safety worries like mad cow disease," said Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Food Program, in a news release Thursday.

The delay applies only to meat and meat products; labels went into effect in April for fish and shellfish. Labels aren't required for restaurants or food services.

Kelsey of the Nebraska Cattlemen says his group favors the labeling.

"However ... the law as written is not very workable," he said Thursday.

His group favors mandatory animal identification for disease-surveillance purposes — addressing mad cow and other concerns — but the current regulations don't require it, Kelsey said.

Kelsey's group also wants simplification and consistency in labeling.

Right now the labeling would be only on fresh beef. He said his group prefers labeling on all products — fresh, frozen or combinations — so that consumers know the beef even in their packaged dinner mixes is from the United States or elsewhere.

The Senate must pass its own spending bill, and a conference committee would have to resolve differences between the two versions before Congress can vote on a final version.