International beef alliance grows

The Five Nations Beef Alliance will now be called the International Beef Alliance. Beef + Lamb New Zealand director George Tatham, who recently attended the Five Nations Beef Alliance in Mexico, welcomed the new members and said the alliance had been effective in creating a strong single voice from the beef industry in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations. “The Five Nations Beef Alliance, as it was then, was a unique grouping in the negotiations, providing a clear and consistent message to the TPP negotiators. As a result, the beef sector has probably achieved the best outcome of all the agricultural commodity groups. “Having Paraguay and Mato Grosso, the largest beef-producing state in Brazil, joining the group can only add to our strength as a beef producers’ representative group.” The group’s principles are focused on promoting the removing all barriers to trade, particularly non-tariff barriers, producing beef sustainably and providing consumers with an excellent beef eating experience. The global market for beef is continuing to increase, now over $59 billion and growing, adding $17 billion in the last four years. “All the projections are for a continuing increase in beef consumption, particularly in the Latin American and Asia-Pacific regions,” said Tatham. “Facilitating beef trade around the globe is going to be absolutely essential to ensure that consumers in these markets have access to an important protein source without artificial barriers to trade. “Joining together as beef producers is the only way to dismantle the morass of regulatory barriers that contribute only to increased beef prices to consumers without any matching benefit.” The International Beef Alliance met last week in Mazatlan in Mexico. As well as admitting the two new members, the beef producer representative organisations from Canada, the US, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand agreed a strategy for working together in the interests of the global beef industry.

International beef alliance grows

A group of five nations that formed an alliance to collaborate on beef trade has now become seven, after Paraguay and Mato Grosso in Brazil became the latest members.

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