Sauk Valley beef producers struggle with the drop in demand

POLO — In January, Justin Rahn was in Cancun. That was where he first started reading news of COVID-19.

Shortly after he returned, the Polo and Mt. Carroll farmer sold his cattle in February, as he usually does. He did it at the right time.

“I had several looks at my cattle when I got back and they gave me bad prices,” Rahn said. “The next week it went up $5 and I got rid of them. It ended up being a good time. It was by luck. After, it fell $35. If I wouldn’t have gotten out, it would have been more of a bloodbath.”

The beef market has fallen since the onset of COVID-19 because of supply chain issues such s processing plants shutting down or cutting back, and the drop in demand because of closed restaurants.

Rahn has around 1,000 feedlot steers as well as some other types of cattle, and in addition to February, he still sells cows throughout the year. He's taking a loss, Rahn said

“Am I going to go broke tomorrow? No. But it’s a financial strain on farmers. I bought cows to fill the feedlot back up in February, and it’s fallen since.”

The current value of Rahn’s cattle won't be enough to pay the bills, Rahn said. The possibility of getting rid of them if he had to is 8 to 10 weeks out.

People have called to ask if they could buy beef from him directly.

Some pig farmers are resorting to selling to individuals to get rid of their livestock and avoid euthanasia. Things won’t come to that for beef farmers, Rahn said, and smaller processing plants are booked up for months, anyways.

Rahn is most frustrated by misconceptions about the supply chain that suggest that there’s a shortage of beef.

“They say there’s a lack of meat in stores,” Rahn said. “In reality, we have lots full of animals ready to go and we can’t get them to markets. It’s a bad situation.”

President Donald Trump signed an executive order last week mandating that meat processing plants stay open, but Ogle County Farm Bureau manager Ron Kern said that may not change much due to the nature of COVID-19 outbreaks that are closing them.

“They shut down and clean up,” Kern said. “When they come back and reopen, if 400 of 1,200 have it, they’re not coming back. The other 800, they’re saying they might not want to go, so there’s absenteeism. They’re only running at 50% capacity at best. And you can’t grab people off the street to do that work.”

The situation will make him a better manager when it comes to cutting costs and expenses, he said. He also farms grain, which also is down due to bad weather last year and ethanol plants being shut down or at minimal capacity, so he's getting hit from both sides.

“What makes me not sleep at night is knowing I’m losing money no matter what I’ll be working on the next day.”

It is the hope of Rahn and other farmers that the economy gets back to where it was before the pandemic. He believes it’ll be slow.

It’s also his hope that he’ll see the same faces in business in August that he saw in January.

“We just want normal, open markets, but this is going to make some people go bankrupt.”