Minnesota State Cattlemens director talks cattle markets and impact of pandemic


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Minnesota State Cattlemens director talks cattle markets and impact of pandemic

The director of the Minnesota State Cattlemens Association finds it difficult to describe how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected cattle markets.

Allison Vanderwal says she started in her role May first when packing plant capacity was around 65 percent.

“And obviously that puts the cattle market through a whole cycle. I think we’re still kind of trying to ride out this pandemic, and we’ll see what happens through the fall and winter. But I think it’s going to have a little bit of an impact for a while.”

She tells Brownfield prior to the pandemic, the cattle industry was shaken by the Tyson packing plant fire in Kansas.

“And everybody started to think about this a little more, whether it’s price discovery and leverage as well. And then now with the COVID pandemic we’re even more concerned and wanting to make more change. We all see that during a time of struggle we can make some changes.”

Vanderwal says she’s hopeful legislation that’s been introduced in Congress will help to increase negotiated cash trade and provide more cattle market transparency. 

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