Cattle ranchers are in federal court today seeking to extend the U.S. ban on Canadian cattle, which put in place in 2003 after the discovery of a case of mad cow disease. Bill Bullard with R-Calf, the Ranchers-Cattleman Action Legal Fund, says keeping mad cow out of the U.S. is critical. “We had 58 of our export customers close their border to the United States when a Canadian cow was discovered in the United States with this disease.” The U.S. Department of Agriculture plans to life the ban March 7to. One Iowa expert says the effort to keep the U.S. ban on Canadian cattle in place may backfire. John Lawrence is an agriculture economist at Iowa State University. Lawrence says “My concern is if we continue to point to Canada and say the product is unsafe, will there become a point where consumers began to believe it? And then will the make the connection to say but wait a minute, you’re not doing anything that they’re not.” The ban on Canadian cattle is scheduled to expire March 7th, but the ranchers in federal court today are seeking an extension of the ban.
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