COOL Should be a Marketing Tool, not a Scare Tactic

by Marshall Edleman

Country-of-origin labeling (popularly known as COOL) for beef and other meat products remains a controversial and divisive issue in the beef industry. A mandatory COOL program is scheduled to take effect in September 2006, but funding for that program is now seriously in question. An alternative to mandatory COOL - House Resolution 2068, a/k/a the Meat Promotion Act – has also recently been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Cattlemen favor COOL in some form – on that point, most of us are in agreement. But some proponents of mandatory COOL seem to go way beyond the desire to distinguish the quality and characteristics of U.S.-raised beef from beef raised in other countries. They would have consumers believe that if beef does not carry a “Raised in the USA” label, it may or may not be safe.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The top priority for all cattlemen should be to assure consumers that all beef offered for sale in the United States is absolutely safe, or it will be removed from the meat case. I am as proud as anyone of the quality of the beef we produce in the United States, but I don’t need to frighten consumers into choosing it over foreign-raised beef. Consumer confidence is essential to growing beef demand, and we cannot undermine that confidence by implying that only “some beef” is safe, while some may or may not be.

Supporters of mandatory COOL also overlook the fact that the vast majority of imported beef sold in the United States won’t fall under the mandatory labeling requirements that they tout so proudly. In fact, the overwhelming majority of imported beef consumed in this country is purchased through foodservice outlets, and therefore will not be labeled under the program that is set to take effect in 2006. So in the average grocery store meat case, over 90 percent of the beef offered for sale will carry the U.S.A.-origin label. Do I really need an expensive, mandatory program to distinguish my product from less than 10 percent of the beef with which it competes? How is that serving the interests of U.S. cattlemen?

In fact, product differentiation is where I part company most strongly with proponents of mandatory COOL. Because such a large percentage of the imported product will be exempt and the vast majority of the product in the retail meat case would carry the U.S. label, mandatory COOL will just homogenize our brand and make it meaningless. Worse yet, we've paid for it (because the cost of business will be pushed down to the cow-calf operator) instead of getting paid for it. For adding value to our product by producing higher-quality, source-verified cattle, we should receive a return on our investment instead of being stuck with added cost.

The success of many voluntary branded beef initiatives, that tout not only quality but also source identification, should be a signal to our industry that a mandatory solution is not needed. Our country was founded on free enterprise, not socialism or isolationism. We need to let the free market system in this country decide the value of origin labeling.

As a cattleman who takes great pride in the beef I raise, I want to appeal to consumers’ desire for a quality product, rather than pander to unfounded fears about food safety. I also want the ability to be innovative and to differentiate my beef from other products – both foreign and domestic. I therefore feel that the voluntary measures proposed in the Meat Promotion Act offer a superior alternative to the costly, mandatory COOL requirements scheduled to take effect in 2006.

Marshall Edleman is a cattleman from Willow Lake, South Dakota, and a member of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA).

Producer-directed and consumer-focused, NCBA is the trade association of America’s cattle farmers and ranchers, and the marketing organization for the largest segment of the nation’s food and fiber industry.