I’m interrupting my blog series about immigration for a timely post on current legislation affecting checkoff programs.

In the past, I’ve blogged about several of the different commodity checkoff programs and explained the basics of them. I’ve written about beef, pork, dairy and lamb checkoff programs.

Last week Meatingplace reported on the bill entitled, ‘‘Opportunities for Fairness in Farming Act of 2023.’’ The stated purpose of the bill is “To prohibit certain practices relating to certain commodity promotion programs, to require greater transparency by those programs, and for other purposes.”

This broad, newly proposed legislation would affect beef, pork, soy, corn, wheat, honey, limes, watermelons, kiwi fruit, eggs, potatoes, cotton and many other checkoff programs, not just the protein checkoffs.

I read both the House and Senate versions of the bill and find the legislation to be largely unnecessary. It doesn’t even address the real issues that some producers have with how checkoff dollars are spent.

First, there is already accountability built into the checkoff programs. The bills are written as if there is no current accountability in how checkoff dollars are used. Checkoffs require annual independent third party audits to make sure the money is spent and accounted for properly.

Second, the bill doesn’t even attempt to fix one of the main issues that some beef producers have with the beef checkoff, namely that the beef checkoff has to promote all beef, even imported beef. Some really dislike that the US beef checkoff can’t say “Eat U.S. Beef” because imported beef also pays into the checkoff. So imported beef (mostly beef trimmings used to make burgers) gets promoted by checkoff marketing just the same as U.S. produced beef. This obvious unfairness really ticks off some beef producers.

One line in the bill reads, “The unlawful use of checkoff programs funds benefits some agricultural producers while harming many others.” I’m not sure what this refers to. It seems to be implying that funds are use illegally, but this would be discovered during annual audits.

Another line reads, “Although the laws establishing checkoff programs broadly prohibit the use of funds in any manner for the purpose of influencing legislation or government action, checkoff programs have repeatedly been shown to use funds to influence policy directly or by partnering with organizations that lobby.” I’d like to hear exactly what proof they have for this. Likely, if referring to the beef checkoff, it pertains to the NCBA and other two-hat state beef councils that promote beef with checkoff programs and also lobby and try to affect legislation. Some states have two-hat beef councils (like Hawaii) and some states have one-hat check off programs that do not lobby or work on legislative issues (like Colorado).

I do think it would be a good idea to separate legislation and politics from all checkoff programs. In 2001, the USDA required that the National Pork Board solely manage the checkoff programs and the National Pork Producers Council handle the public policy. In other words, the USDA mandated that checkoff funds be completely managed separately from policy funds, staff and resources. Doing this with beef would eliminate many of the clouds of distrust that some beef producers have with the way the beef checkoff is set up. It currently has two large contractors that do both policy work and checkoff work. This isn’t a popular idea to discuss in the beef checkoff world, but I think it would be more fair and clean to separate the management of policy and checkoff funds.

Most checkoff programs allow the producers that pay the checkoff dollar to get their money back if they want to. This is fair and it means that checkoffs are voluntary. With just a little paperwork you can get your money back each year if you’re not happy with the way the checkoff programs are being run. One change that would be beneficial for the beef checkoff is to allow the producer to actually get their money refunded instead of just redirected.

I have to admire the perseverance of the groups making enough noise to get two bills put forward to reform the checkoff programs. While I disagree with the language in the bills, this does prove that when you make enough noise long enough, you can promote action.

What changes to the checkoff programs would you like to see?

Changing the checkoffs

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