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‘Negotiated cash trade’ debate continues

Proposals to establish a mandatory minimum for negotiated cash trade in the cattle industry continue to stir debate.

One of those proposals would mandate 50 percent of cattle be traded on a negotiated cash basis with 14-day delivery.

Iowa cattle feeder and commodity broker Brad Kooima says he supports the idea.

“I don’t know what the magic number is. Nobody does. Whether it’s 31 or 48 or whatever,” Kooima says. “But if we don’t have the nerve, the guts, the courage to try to effect change now, then I don’t know that this industry will ever try.”

Livestock market analyst Corbitt Wall agrees that something needs to change.

“As we keep going down this road, we’re going to continue to lose feeders,” Wall says. “We’re not going to lose the big corporate feeders. We’re going to lose the independent feeders.”

Opponents of the concept say it would restrict marketing options for producers and require more government involvement in their business.

Kooima and Wall spoke during an Iowa Cattlemen’s Association cattle market webinar.