Farm Management Newsletter

Quarterly Publication of Ohio State University Extension

Spring 2002

New Calf and Cattle Marketing Opportunities for Ohio Beef Producers

By Brian Roe

Ohio has lots of corn, easy access to many consumers and a strong tradition of quality production in the cow-calf and feedlot sectors. However, marketing options for Ohio beef producers are limited by the long trucking distance to most major packing plants. How can beef producers make the most of marketing options or even create a few of their own? Two initiatives are currently in progress in Ohio that broaden the possibilities and can potentially increase beef producers' profits.

The first is the Great Lakes Family Farm (GLFF) producers cooperative. The efforts of this cooperative focus on producing quality beef that earns above average prices by meeting the unique needs of Ohio consumers. Initial efforts of this group focused on carefully marketing cattle to outlets that best suited the animals' inherent quality traits. These efforts have paid off. During the summer and fall of 2001, 300 cattle were evaluated for carcass quality using ultrasound technology allowing producers to better sort animals by quality and choose among marketing outlets that valued these quality traits. These additional sorting and targeting efforts earned producers an extra $30 per animal. Future efforts will focus on both increasing the flow of information concerning individual animal feedlot and carcass performance back to the cow-calf operator and on identifying Ohio consumers' demands for beef characteristics. This information can then be used to target sales to local consumers who are willing to pay more for these characteristics. For more information concerning the efforts and opportunities available through GLFF contact Dan Frobose at (419) 354-6916.

The second opportunity is through the Five State Beef Initiative (FSBI, www.5statebeef.org). The FSBI is a partnership between beef cattle associations, land grant universities, state departments of agriculture, Farm Bureaus and United Producers Incorporated in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio. Their goal is to help small to medium-sized beef producers in the Eastern Corn Belt capture more value from their cattle by meeting consumer expectations through a responsive production, marketing and information sharing system. Five thousand animals entered the FSBI system in 2000 and were harvested in 2001. These animals served as a test to determine hurdles and roadblocks for the vertically coordinated system. In the fall of 2001, FSBI signed a six-month trial agreement with eMerge Interactive to serve as an online database warehouse. Records are currently being entered into that database to evaluate the system and to evaluate how easily producers can access their lifetime animal information using the Internet. The data system has the benefit of allowing producers to benchmark their data against average data from other producers in the system. It also allows beef marketers to validate that a particular producer took additional steps with respect to animal health, animal handling/well-being practices, environmental stewardship or animal genetics, which allows the animal or resulting beef cuts to enter certain value-added marketing channels and gain additional profits. Producer training/certification programs for the FSBI will be offered locally beginning in early 2002 across all five states. For more information concerning FSBI opportunities in Ohio call (614) 873-6736.

For more information on GLFF call Dan Frobose at (419) 354-6916. For more information on FSBI in Ohio call (614) 873-6736.