Alberta Beef Producers refunded slightly more than $1 million to cattle producers in the first three months after its checkoff became refundable.
Slightly fewer than 400 producers requested a refund of their $3 per head checkoff during the April 1 to June 30 collection period, representing 38 percent of the checkoff collected.
ABP chair Chuck MacLean said the percentage of money refunded is about what the organization hoped for.
The worst-case scenario was refund requests of up to 50 percent. ABP’s goal was to have no more than 40 percent and was pleased with 38 percent.
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“Hopefully the percentage will hold,” said MacLean, who estimates ABP can maintain a $5 million a year budget if refund requests don’t change.
The organization collected $2.7 million during the collection period and refunded $1.03 million.
Eleven producers requested refunds that accounted for 48 percent of the refunded money and 35 producers accounted for two-thirds.
The other 358 producers represented one-third of the refund requests.
“Eleven big yards took half of the money,” MacLean said.
Refund requests are new territory for ABP, which was established in 1969 as the Alberta Cattle Commission with a $1 per head checkoff.
The organization’s largest budget was in 2006-07, when 4.6 million marketed cattle produced $13.8 million in check-off fees, of which $4.6 million went to the national agency and $9.2 million to the provincial agency.
Last year, the provincial government passed legislation that changed the mandatory, non-refundable checkoff to a mandatory, refundable checkoff to appease large feedlot operators who felt they were paying a disproportionate amount of checkoff for the value they received.
Anticipating a loss of income this year, ABP set aside $5 million for its budget and slashed spending to make up the difference.
MacLean said part of the group’s focus during its upcoming fall meetings is to bring more awareness to producers of the benefits of the ABP and to help limit the amount of refund requests.
MacLean has travelled to eight of the nine zones to talk to producers about their concerns with the cattle industry and the organization and help convince producers to leave their check-off money with ABP.
He said instead of dwelling on the number of people who have requested refunds, he wants to focus on the producers who didn’t request a refund.
“These people understand the value of what ABP does,” he said.
ABP will also discuss the launch of a loyalty rewards program this fall to help producers realize the benefits of keeping their money in the cattle organization.
“If you never try anything new, you’ll never know,” MacLean said.
“Two years from now we’ll know if we were right or wrong, but you need to try.”
