The Iowa Cattlemen’s Association plans to ask the 2026 Iowa legislature to cap and limit interest rates in Iowa’s Beginning Farmer Program.
Bryan Whaley, the association’s CEO, said eligibility rules should be expanded, too, to help young farmers acquire land and equipment. “They have a significant struggle to get into cattle production and just farming in general due to the access to land and, obviously, the access to capital,” Whaley said.
The group proposes eliminating the state’s Forest or Fruit Tree Reservation Property Tax Exemption as a way to open up more pastureland for cattle. “Bovine can do a lot of things to help with soil fertility which will hold some of that groundwater and strengthen that soil,” Whaley said.
The group held a news conference at a beef operation in Mitchellville to unveil its “Building Iowa’s Cattle Future” plan. It includes a call for lawmakers to support more regional beef processing to help the industry which saw plants in Nebraska and Illinois close recently.
“It takes a long time to build a processing plant and it takes a long time to rebuild a cow herd,” said Craig Moss of Hull, president of the association’s executive committee. “Just the life cycle alone, you know, a heifer that was born this spring, going to be weaned this fall, is not going to, not going to have a calf until she’s two years old. And that calf’s going to take anywhere from 12 to 24 months to hit the market as beef.”
The group also favors a ban the use of eminent domain to seize land for private development.
(Reporting and photography by Brent Barnett, Brownfield Ag News; additional reporting by Radio Iowa’s O. Kay Henderson)