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An Assured Public and a Clean Environment
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By Eddie Funderburg, Ph.D.
It is becoming more obvious that activist groups and
consumers are going to demand our industry produce beef in an
environmentally sound manner. These demands should not be a problem for
ranchers to meet. Long-term profitability and sustainability of
commercial beef cattle operations require attention to these same
principles.
The Texas Beef Quality Producer Program was
developed in a collaborative effort between the TSCRA, Texas Beef
Council and Texas AgriLife Extension Service (TAES) to bring these
issues to producers’ attention.
The program was designed to address issues related
to food safety, beef quality and environmental management that are
economically important to Texas producers.
Livestock production in the U.S. is coming under
closer public scrutiny. “Animal welfare” and “environmentally friendly”
are terms we as an industry must understand and embrace. These two
issues will become more important than beef quality and on the same
level as food safety in the coming years.
Luckily for cow-calf producers, understanding and
embracing these two issues can add dollars to your pockets.
Two
issues: One obvious, the other maybe
not so obvious
“Animal welfare” is a given for most producers. If
cattle are managed and handled with their welfare in mind, then they
grow faster and require fewer inputs from feed and medicine.
The “environmentally friendly” concept is one that
many do not seem to see as an advantage to our industry. Management
practices that would be considered “friendly” to the environment are
practices that improve ground cover, reduce erosion and reduce herbicide
and fertilizer needs.
Water quality is an issue that will become more
critical to our industry. Agriculture production is in control of the
water supply for the rest of the nation. It is estimated that only 3
percent of the U.S. population is involved in production agriculture. If
the other 97 percent of the population is not confident we are doing all
we can to prevent contamination of the water supply with herbicides,
pesticides, bacteria and silt they will call for increased regulation of
production practices to make sure we are doing what we should have
already been doing.
Because most of the water going into our streams,
rivers and lakes comes across a cow pasture, we have a responsibility to
make sure we do not contaminate the water. Run-off from every pasture
goes into some municipal water supply.
By becoming proactive as an industry to promote and
showcase the positive things that are being done in the area of
environmental stewardship ranching can position itself in the driver’s
seat of this issue.
Identify and rectify
On the other side, identify the areas of production
that need improvement and move forward to rectify those potential
problems before they are debated in a public format and governmental
regulation is imposed to “fix” the problem.
If you think about beef safety and quality from the
standpoint of “Would I eat any and every animal that I sell?”, then you
should think about environmental management in the context of “Would I
drink the water that runs across or off of my property and into the
ponds and rivers?”
From a practical standpoint every ranch should
sample the water entering and leaving their operation and establish a
benchmark. We can’t defend a practice when we don’t know what the test
results might reveal.
If someone were to ask you what the salmonella or
E. coli
bacterial load leaving your property was could you tell them? Being able
to respond with a prompt concise and accurate answer tells those asking
the question that you are also concerned about contamination of your and
their water supply.
Making water better
when it leaves
What can be done to help improve water quality
leaving a ranching operation? For cow-calf operations it may be as
simple as proper management of stocking rate. Ground cover serves as a
filter system to prevent silt and other contaminates from moving into
the water supply.
In stocker operations the development of filter
strips and grass cover in waterways running across fields have the
benefit of reducing erosion and reducing fertilizer and herbicide
movement out of the fields and providing dry roughage for the cattle to
consume during the grazing period and provide for production of hay
during the summer for use the next year.
These strips also slow silting in ponds and provide
bedding areas and solid sod during periods of extended wet weather.
Other good management practices to implement are
sound record keeping systems to document everything that was applied and
the conditions in which they were applied. Apply fertilizers only as
needed by soil tests.
If animal waste is applied, make sure a nutrient
management plan is in place and carefully monitor levels of phosphorus
and nitrogen.
Bacterial contamination should be monitored for the
safety of livestock and contamination of the water supply.
Another area of concern is herbicides and pesticides
applied to the land. Apply at recommended rates and only use approved
products. Proper management of stocking rate and grass cover will reduce
the need for herbicides to control weeds.
Sample water as it enters your operation and also as
it leaves your operation.
If contamination or pathogens are entering an
operation, you need to know this for the safety of your livestock. If
contaminates are leaving the operation at levels higher than those
levels entering, then start evaluating management practices to reduce
the contamination level.
Keep in mind that chances of major contamination in
extensive grazing operations are limited, but it only takes one
occurrence to give the industry a black eye. Be proactive and prevent
regulatory intervention in our industry.
n
Eddie Funderburg is a soil and crops specialist with The Samuel Roberts
Noble Foundation, Ardmore, Okla.
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