Email, Kari Heerman, agricultural economist, U.S. Department of Agriculture, June 29, 2017

2:09 p.m.

Thanks for your patience.  The answer to your questions follow.  I have also provided some links to further information.  If you have additional questions, feel free to follow up by phone or email and I’ll do my best to get you the information you need.

• A very simple answer: France does import beef from the United States, but it does not import beef treated with hormones that are commonly used throughout North America.  We do not have data to determine whether/how much of the beef that is exported to France comes from Texas.

Some more detail:

• To your question about the spreadsheet: The spreadsheet contains the quantity of beef and veal imports and exports by month by source/destination country in terms of 1,000 pound carcass weight equivalent.  As an example, the quantity of U.S. beef exports to France in May 2015 can be found in cell GG130 and was 2,000 pounds carcass weight equivalent.  This data comes from the Census Bureau.

• Data are not collected on trade flows of beef by state, so we do not know whether/how much came from Texas.  ERS does estimate the value of agricultural exports by state for selected commodities, including beef, but we do not have estimates by destination.

• France, as a member of the European Union does restrict beef exports from the United States.  Beef treated with hormones that are common in North American beef production has been banned by the European Union since 1989.

• To export beef to the European Union, U.S. exporters have to participate in USDA’s Non-Hormone Treated Cattle (NHTC) program.  This beef is further subject to a tariff rate quota (TRQ), which means that this beef can enter the E.U. duty free up to a limit (in this case 45,000 metric tons), beyond that it is subject to a high tariff.  Here is a relatively recent article from ERS’s in-house magazine, Amber Waves,  that discusses the growth in U.S. beef exports to the European Union under this program (U.S. Beef Exports to the EU Grow Despite Trade Barriers).

• If you are further interested in this subject: The U.S. has successfully challenged the EU’s ban on hormone-treated beef as a violation of trade rules agreed under the WTO’s Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement).  This CBO study contains the details.

I apologize for the delay in getting back to you.  Please let me know if I can be further helpful.

Best Regards,

Kari Heerman