Profitable Beef Production - So They Say - Brief Article

Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm and Resource Issues, Fall, 2001

Edward Luttwak writes, "[W]hile European and North American cattle raisers pay their dues to the corporations that supply them with everything from tractors and fuel to bagged concentrates, we [ranchers in Bolivia] pay our dues to nature by accepting its pace and limits. So far that has been a rewarding choice: our return on cattle capital exceeds 30 percent, more than twice what North American and European cattle raisers can expect, though their corporate suppliers fare much better of course.

The profitability of the entire sector is so tenuous in the United States that many ranchers stay in business only because they are not in business at all but rather keep their ranches for pleasure and display.... " Luttwak, Edward. "It's What's for Dinner." Harper's Magazine, August 2001, pp. 11-16.