70+ Organizations Involved in Beef Checkoff Programs

During the last four years, about 40 universities and more than 30 other private and government entities have carried out research projects funded with national beef checkoff dollars.  Five separate beef industry organizations are coordinating on those and other checkoff programs in fiscal 2003, according to a report stemming from efforts of the Beef Board’s Hammond Commission.

The Commission was made up of eight producers representing the Beef Board and state beef councils.  The commission was appointed in September 2001 by the Beef Board’s chairman at the time, Dan Hammond, to review beef checkoff budgeting and program funding processes. In December 2001, the group made recommendations regarding the processes and the Beef Board has been working to implement them.

At the heart of the Commission’s work is an effort to ensure that industry organizations that are eligible to submit proposals for expenditure of checkoff dollars — but have not recently submitted any — are fully informed of the process for doing so. As part of its work to implement that recommendation, the Beef Board has contacted more than 20 eligible organizations, some of which have since expressed interest in participating in the beef checkoff program’s planning and budgeting process for fiscal 2004.