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PRESS RELEASES

October & August 2011

Tariff on U.S. pork lifted by Mexico
NPPC questions need for EPA reporting rule; welcomes more open process
NPPC claims vicory with Passage of FTAs
PRRS Costs Industry $641 Million Annually

Tariff On U.S. Pork Lifted By Mexico

Washington, October 21, 2011 - The National Pork Producers Council today praised the U.S. and Mexican governments for following through on resolving a trade dispute over trucking. Mexico today lifted tariffs on U.S. exports, including pork, and the U.S. government last week granted the first permit to a Mexican trucking firm to haul goods into the United States.

The two governments in July signed an agreement resolving the trucking issue, with the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) crafting a cross-border trucking program and the Mexican government cutting the retaliatory tariffs by 50 percent. The remaining tariffs were suspended today after DOT issued the trucking permit.

"America's pork producers are very pleased that the United States issued the first Mexican trucking permit, which has led today to the Mexican government removing the remaining retaliatory tariffs on our products," said NPPC President Doug Wolf, a producer from Lancaster, Wis. "Mexico is a very important market for the U.S. pork industry and for many other sectors. More than 6 million U.S. jobs depend on trade with Mexico."

The long-standing dispute between the nations was over a provision of the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The trucking provision was set to become effective in December 1995, but the United States failed to abide by it. Mexico imposed tariffs on 89 U.S. products in March 2009, after Congress failed to renew a two-year-old pilot program that allowed a limited number of Mexican trucks into the United States. Mexico added products, including pork, in August 2010 after the Obama administration failed to present a proposal for resolving the trucking dispute.

"It is important that the Unites States abides by its NAFTA obligations and does not yield to protectionist forces," Wolf said. "U.S. exports and American jobs are at stake."

Mexico is the second largest market for the U.S. pork industry, which shipped $986 million of pork south of the border in 2010. Since 1993 - the year before NAFTA was implemented - U.S. pork exports to Mexico have increased by 780 percent.

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NPPC Questions Need For EPA Reporting Rule;

Welcomes More Open Process

Washington, October 21, 2011 - While questioning the need for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's latest proposed Clean Water Act (CWA) reporting rule for large livestock operations, the National Pork Producers Council applauded the agency for at least acknowledging the concerns of livestock producers and for offering options to address them.

EPA's proposed Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) Reporting Rule seeks to have CAFOs submit to the agency operational information so it "can more effectively carry out its CAFO permitting programs on a national level and ensure that CAFOs are implementing practices to protect water quality and human health." The information includes basic facility facts, such as contact information, location of a CAFO's production area, permit status, the number and type of animals confined and the number of acres available for land application of manure.

The agency is considering one of two reporting options: 1) require every CAFO to report information to EPA unless states with authorized CWA permitting programs choose to provide it on behalf of the CAFOs in their state; or 2) require CAFOs in "focus" watersheds that have water quality concerns associated with CAFOs to report information to EPA.

"We applaud EPA's alternative targeted approach to addressing real water quality issues," said NPPC President Doug Wolf, a pork producer from Lancaster, Wis. "This sets the stage for a more open dialogue among stakeholders over where these policies should go."

The proposal was prompted by a May 2010 settlement agreement EPA entered with the Natural Resources Defense Council, Waterkeeper Alliance and the Sierra Club as part of a lawsuit NPPC brought and ultimately won over EPA's 2008 CAFO rule. The 2008 rule required, among other things, that large livestock operations that propose to or that might discharge into waterways obtain CWA permits. On NPPC's suit, a federal court ruled that the CWA requires permits only for operations actually discharging.

Under the settlement agreement, which was developed without the participation of the livestock industry and was not required or ordered by any court -- and now the proposed reporting rule -- EPA and the environmental groups are seeking to undermine the federal court decision by reclassifying the CWA permit process as simply informational.

"Our government is not supposed to operate through a process of secret settlements," Wolf said. "Pork producers decry that settlement agreement as the product of a bad and closed process that improperly attempted to make major policy decision out of the public eye, and this rule is a product of that flawed process."

NPPC and other livestock groups raised concerns about the settlement, including its potential to undermine farm biosecurity that protects the safety of America's food supply, with U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who worked with EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to come up with a rule that acknowledges the concerns and seeks public comment on them.

Despite USDA's and DHS's intervention, the proposed reporting rule is still problematic, said NPPC, presuming, for example, that CAFOs, by nature, discharge pollutants and that, that can be proved through an information collection process.

The EPA proposal will be open for public comment for 60 days after its publication in the Federal Register. For more information about the proposal, visit http://cfpub.epa.gov/npdes/afo/aforule.cfm.

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NPPC Claims Victory With Passage of FTAs

Washington, October 12, 2011 - Calling it one of the “greatest victories ever for the U.S. pork industry,” the National Pork Producers Council lauded today’s congressional approval of the free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea.

“These trade agreements will be a boon for U.S. pork producers and for the U.S. economy and jobs,” said Doug Wolf, NPPC president and a pork producer from Lancaster, Wis. “Passage of these FTAs is one of the greatest victories ever for the U.S. pork industry.”

The Senate and House last night passed each of the FTAs by comfortable margins.

The deals with Colombia, Panama and South Korea, when fully implemented, will generate nearly $772 million in new pork sales, add more than $11 to the price producers receive for each hog marketed and create more than 10,000 pork industry jobs, according to Iowa State University economist Dermot Hayes.

“It was extremely important that we approved these FTAs now,” Wolf said, “because while these deals have languished for more than four years, our competitors have negotiated their own trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea, and the United States has lost market share in those countries.”

The U.S. pork industry was instrumental in getting the trade agreements approved, particularly the deal with South Korea. Last December when the United States and the Asian nation were at an impasse over trade in autos, the U.S. pork industry agreed to move back the effective date for when much of its exports enter Korea at a zero tariff rate. NPPC led the agricultural community in support of the FTAs.

“America’s pork producers are grateful to the Obama administration's trade team, including U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, and to Congress for getting the trade agreements done,” Wolf said. “Now we call on the United States and these three FTA partners to get the agreements implemented ASAP. The longer it takes to implement, the more U.S. market share in these nations will be imperiled.”

Exports are vital to the U.S. pork industry, which last year shipped nearly $4.8 billion of pork, an amount that added about $56 to the price producers received for each hog marketed.

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Pork Checkoff Study: PRRS Costs Industry $641 Million Annually

Washington, August 2011 - A new study, underwritten by the Pork Checkoff and conducted by Iowa State University, estimates that porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) continues to be a major drag on the U.S. pork industry - costing the pork industry $641 million per year. This translates into $1.8 million per day or $114.71 per sow annually.

The previous economic study in 2005 calculated PRRS losses at $560 million annually.

National Pork Board President Everett Forkner, a producer from Richards, Mo., said, "This Checkoff-funded work offers producers, veterinarians and every part of the pork chain a new and valuable insight into the economic impact of PRRS and underscores why we've leveraged domestic and international government funds to offer producers tools for regional control of this virus."

The 2011 study differed most significantly from the 2005 study in the allocation of losses between the breeding and the growing pig herds. Specifically, losses in the growing pig herd accounted for 88 percent of the total cost of PRRS in the 2005 study compared with 55 percent in the current analysis.

Iowa State University veterinarian Derald Holtkamp and agricultural economist Jim Kliebenstein collaborated on the study with others in academia, swine veterinarians in private practice and the USDA. They found that differences between the 2005 and the 2011 studies may be attributed to several key factors, including changes in the prevalence of PRRS virus and incidence of outbreaks, production and animal health management practices, inflation (accounts for 40 percent of the increase) and other pathogens that have emerged since 2005, such as porcine circovirus.

The report summary stated, "Since the 2005 study, pig production and health strategies have evolved, PRRS virus control/elimination strategies have improved and structural adjustments have occurred in the industry. Because of these developments, it was reasonable to question whether the incidence, severity and/or impact of PRRS outbreaks on pig health and productivity in the U.S. herd may have changed since the 2005 study was conducted."

The new study collected much of its data from cooperating producers and veterinarians across the United States in late 2010. While not benchmarked in 2005, additional PRRS-related costs that producers must contend with, such as veterinary and biosecurity measures, were collected in this study. Researchers found these costs added $477.79 million annually to total PRRS costs, putting the cumulative cost of the disease at more than $1 billion per year when added to production-related losses.

Based upon a survey of swine veterinarians from across the United States, the study's researchers were able to estimate additional PRRS statistics. They found that 28 percent of sows and gilts used for breeding in the United States were PRRS virus-free and 60 percent of weaned pigs were PRRS-negative at placement.

"This study also confirmed conventional wisdom that says outbreaks in PRRS virus-free herds are more severe than outbreaks in PRRS virus-infected herds," Holtkamp said. "When comparing elimination methods, we found that the time required for herds to provide a return on investment was still relatively short with herd closure and rollover. However, we found that complete depopulation/repopulation appears to make economic sense only if there are other reasons to depopulate the herd or for high-value genetics herds."

According to Lisa Becton, Checkoff's director of swine health, the complete Checkoff-funded research study on PRRS will serve as a valuable resource for producers, veterinarians and the entire industry for years to come as more of its data is analyzed. She said the full report is expected to be available in coming months and will be available on pork.org.

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