Despite struggles elsewhere, it has been a record year for beef prices. However, livestock economists say production trends could be holding them back.
“It’s really hard to push those prices higher when we’ve got more supplies. Now on the cull cow side, the non-feed beef, clearly, we’re culling fewer cows. We’ve got the fewest beef cows since 1961. We’re culling fewer dairy cows so that total supply of non-fed beef, that’s really going to ground beef, is much less than a year ago. So that’s keeping those kind of wholesale ground beef and cull cow prices high, but keeping a lid on where our fed cattle can go,” said David Anderson.
Anderson adds that when it comes to the futures market, there was a lot of enthusiasm this summer.
