Border reopens to cattle, Mexican industry changes
Hagstrom Report Follow
The United States reopened the Arizona border to Mexican cattle on Aug. 24, but the Agriculture Department’s Foreign Agricultural Service noted that the inability to export to the United States had changed the Mexican cattle industry.
The U.S. closed the border two years ago due to the presence of New World screwworm in Mexico. Screwworm made its way to the United States, but Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters last week that there were only two active cases in the U.S.
According to the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, those cases are in goats and sheep in Texas.
New World screwworm and the U.S. ban on Mexican cattle imports have disrupted the traditional northern Mexican ranching model of a low-overhead, high-turnover system, FAS said.
Mexican producers are expected to increase resources towards domestic feeding infrastructure, allowing cattle to be retained and finished locally, FAS said.
