Bill Jameson has worn many hats during his 30 years in the cattle business.
Now he’s donning the armour of a political warrior as he attempts to save an industry that he says is under siege.
“We need a voice at the negotiating table that represents all cattlemen, and that is why the Saskatchewan Cattlemen’s Association has evolved,” he said.
Jameson knows the issues well.
He is a partner in a ranch near Bethune, Sask., where he runs a yearling operation with 5,000 head of commercial yearling steers and heifers and operates a 3,500 head feedlot.
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He is also the “J” in JGL Livestock, a cattle order buying company in Moose Jaw, Sask.
He wasn’t born on a farm, but his interest in cattle began when he took a job in a packing plant in his home province of Alberta.
He transferred to Saskatchewan with Canada Packers in 1970. He then became a cattle buyer and a cattle dealer and his interest eventually grew through what he calls a “natural evolution” to cattle ranching.
As an owner of JGL, he thinks of himself primarily as a businessperson. Two of his children work at JGL: one in risk management and the other as a cattle buyer.
“A good day is when you make your customers happy, and you make a little money,” he said.
“The cattle industry is a passion for me. It’s my whole life.”
Things have changed in the 30 years he’s been in the cattle industry, he said.
“When I first entered the business, part of the cattleman’s creed to government was, ‘stay out of our business.’ That has since disappeared because the industry has become so international in scope that we can’t operate without being involved in government. That’s a fact of life in agriculture these days.”
He said today’s cattle industry faces troubled economics and major issues that will take years to solve.
“I’d have to call it under siege.”
However, 30 years in the cattle business have left Jameson familiar with solving issues.
He watched as trade and tariff issues on beef and cattle were solved in the 1970s and 1980s and as animal health issues such as brucellosis were successfully tackled.
“There’s all kinds of things that we’ve accomplished, but it’s also a moving target,” he said.
“Every time we satisfy an issue, there’s another one. In recent years, there’s been so many that we’re into overload mode.”
As an SCA board member, Jameson’s main objective is to protect the cow population. In the 1970s, Saskatchewan produced fewer than 500,000 cows. Numbers have since grown to 1.3 to 1.4 million head.
“We can’t go backward. We’ve got 25 million acres of either marginal land or grassland and we absolutely need the cattle industry in this province,” he said.
“We don’t want to go back to a domestic cattle industry. In order to have a vibrant economy in this province, we need to export all our agricultural commodities.”
Other issues for Jameson included regulatory hurdles related to traceability and specified risk materials, as well as country-of-origin labelling in the United States that is impeding livestock trade to that country.
“These are all issues that are putting us in an uncompetitive position with our biggest competition as well as our biggest customer, and that’s the United States,” Jameson said.
