Three beef producers were among the nearly 11,000 participants at the American Dietetic Association Conference in St. Louis late last month. Assisting with a beef booth and other checkoff-funded efforts, the producers had an opportunity to present their case for beef as a great part of a healthy diet.

Pat Blum (pronounced: bloom), a beef producer from Reliance, South Dakota, and the chairman of the Joint Health Professional Influencers Subcommittee, says this meeting provided access to a key audience for the beef industry to address.  

Cut #1         :22          Outcue: "...their healthy lifestyle."

Blum says the beef producers who assisted staff in the beef booth at the show had an opportunity to be up close and personal with people making dietary recommendations for consumers.

Cut #2         :34          Outcue: "...fix beef recipes."

According to Blum, working through the dietitian community is an effective and legitimate means of communicating to consumers, through the beef checkoff program, that beef can be a very key component of a healthy diet.

Cut #3         :26          Outcue: "...pays for research."

Other beef producers working at the ADA conference on behalf of the Beef Checkoff Program were David Dick of Missouri and Mike Vache (VOCH-ee)of Oklahoma.
 
Checkoff-funded nutrition education and information efforts are coordinated on behalf of America’s Beef Producers and the Cattlemen’s Beef Board by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association.  The beef producer members of the Beef Board administer the $1-per-head Beef Checkoff Program. Oversight is provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. 

The national Beef Checkoff Program is administered by the Cattlemen’s Beef Promotion and Research Board, a group of 108 beef producers appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture.  They represent producers from coast-to-coast and volunteer their time to help identify programs that can help increase beef demand.  The checkoff was created in the 1985 Farm Bill, with oversight provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The checkoff assesses $1 per head on the sale of live domestic and imported cattle and a comparable assessment on imported beef and beef products. States retain up to 50 cents on the dollar and forward the other 50 cents to the Cattlemen’s Beef Board, which administers the national checkoff program, subject to USDA approval.