By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press

The proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement has U.S. cattle groups divided over the effect it would have on cattlemen and the beef industry.

The pact would eventually eliminate all tariffs between the participating countries -- the United States, Australia, Chile, Singapore, Peru, Brunei, Vietnam and New Zealand.

That has the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund, United Stockgrowers of America, concerned.

In a 49-page document, the organization requests that the International Trade Commission recommend to President Obama that the Trans-Pacific trade pact be rejected.

"Of concern is the fact the TPP will give New Zealand duty-free, unlimited access to the U.S., and New Zealand has been building its cattle herd while the U.S. herd continues to contract," said Bill Bullard, CEO of R-CALF USA.

The U.S. currently has no free-trade agreement with New Zealand, which is the fourth-largest exporter of beef to the United States.

Gregg Doud, chief economist for National Cattlemen's Beef Association, is less concerned with the agreement and New Zealand's access to U.S. beef markets.

"We already have agreements with nearly all of these countries," he said. "How does that (TPP) really benefit us in selling more into those countries? We already have the access we need."

As far as increased imports, New Zealand is already leaving 24 percent of its access to U.S. beef markets unfilled, and eliminating the 2 cent-per-pound tariff isn't going to affect trade, he said.

"There's really no impact on this related to beef trade at this time," Doud said.

That said, "we categorically oppose any possibility of these countries (specifically, Australia) to reopen the discussion and have another bite at the apple," he said.

Doud said the cattle industry has bigger issues to address than this trade agreement.

"I'm focused like a laser beam on getting beef into Japan and China," he said. "From a dollars standpoint, economics of the beef industry, I can't justify spending time on TPP. If there's a possibility of folding them (Japan and China) in somehow, then you'd have our undivided attention."

More immediately, Doud wants Congress focused on passing the pending free-trade agreement with South Korea.

Bullard said free-trade agreements haven't resulted in free markets, and R-CALF recommends an overhaul of existing trade policy that has harmed U.S. cattlemen.

Trade policy has given foreign countries greater access to the U.S. for more than two decades has increased supplies of imports, resulting in lower prices to cattle producers, Bullard said in his testimony last week before the Trade Commission.

Trade agreements may have benefited U.S. packers and retailers, but the promised gains have not materialized for cattle producers or the rural economies they support, he said.

The ITC expects to submit its report to the U.S. Trade Representative by early June.