{"id":387931,"date":"2026-09-02T05:02:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T05:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/387931\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T05:02:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T05:02:14","slug":"more-foreign-beef-is-coming-to-lower-grocery-prices-florida-farmers-say-it-could-hurt-domestic-production","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/387931\/","title":{"rendered":"More foreign beef is coming to lower grocery prices \u2014 Florida farmers say it could hurt domestic production"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 President Trump is taking action to bring down the price of beef at the grocery store, but Florida farmers say the plan could hurt them at a very critical time.<\/p>\n

Starting Tuesday, the administration is expanding the amount of lean beef trimmings that can enter the United States at lower tariff rates. <\/p>\n

The foreign beef will come in at about 25% below market price primarily for use in ground beef.<\/p>\n

Why now?<\/p>\n

Beef prices are at record levels, and the nation\u2019s cattle herd is at its lowest point in 75 years.<\/p>\n

President Trump says increasing the supply of foreign beef is the fastest way to bring prices down for consumers.<\/p>\n

The plan allows up to 300,000 metric tons of additional beef imports over 90 days; that\u2019s roughly 661 million pounds. <\/p>\n

The import window lasts 90 days.<\/p>\n

RELATED | Florida cattle ranchers push back as Trump seeks to increase beef imports<\/a><\/p>\n

Florida farmers say the timing couldn\u2019t be worse<\/p>\n

The American Farm Bureau Federation is opposing the move, saying flooding the market with underpriced imports could undermine domestic production and hurt farmers long after the temporary tariff relief ends.<\/p>\n

St. Johns County rancher and Florida Farm Bureau President Jeb Smith says American cattle producers are already under enormous pressure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe that if we have America first, that we should put our farmers first, because food security is national security. I think one of the best things we can do is be able to provide for our own and feed our own people,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have pests, we have disease. We now have trade issues that continue to be threats to our producers,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Smith says a downturn in the market could force some producers to make a painful decision, one that goes far beyond the cattle industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe realize that if we don\u2019t have that viability, a lot of times our producers have no other choice but to sell it to a developer and it becomes houses or strip malls,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

Deep roots in St. Johns County<\/p>\n

Cattle ranching has deep roots in St. Johns County and Smith says the stakes extend far beyond this county\u2019s borders.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt started in Florida and secondarily to Manatee County. I\u2019ll give them their credit, St. Johns County was next. We have 9.7 million acres of ag land in the state of Florida. Almost half of that is in cattle production,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

Smith says lower prices today could discourage farmers from expanding their herds tomorrow, raising a bigger question about the long-term future of domestic beef production.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo we become more dependent on foreign production rather than domesticated production? Those are questions that a lot of producers are going to have to ask,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

His message to the administration is simple, reconsider.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 President Trump is taking action to bring down the price of beef at the grocery…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":387932,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[28,116,118,117,5902],"class_list":["post-387931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-florida","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-st-johns-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=387931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=387931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=387931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=387931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}