One of the main goals of the Beef Industry Long Range Plan came to fruition this summer, when the value of U.S. beef exports surpassed the value of imports, making the U.S. a net beef exporter for the first time since the discovery of BSE closed most international markets to U.S. beef in December 2003. Since the summer cattle industry meeting, August beef plus beef variety meat exports surpassed July totals by almost 15 percent, and set a new, all-time monthly record in terms of value. The record total of $416 million exceeds the previous record of $387 million - set in June 2003 - by 7.5 percent. Year-to-date, beef exports have recovered 93 percent of value and 75 percent of volume when compared to January through August 2003.

Mexico and Canada continue to perform remarkably well for U.S. beef, as they combined to account for about 60 percent of beef export volume and 63 percent of export value in August. Beef exports to Japan over the first eight months of 2008 totaled 113 million pounds valued at $265 million, representing an increase of 64 percent in both volume and value over last year. Beef exports to Russia are being adversely impacted by global currency trends. January through August exports to Russia totaled 63.8 million pounds valued at $67.5 million, and August exports set a new monthly value record at nearly $25 million; beef exports have gained traction in South Korea, with August totals of 27.3 million pounds valued at $62.7 million; and exports to the ASEAN region set a new record in August with a volume of 11.9 million pounds valued at $17.5 million.