Creekstone Farms Premium Beef
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, LLC is a conventional and angus beef producer and limited liability company with livestock based in Campbellsburg, Kentucky and processing and sales in Arkansas City, Kansas. The CEO of Creekstone, John Stewart (who is also the owner of the Triad Foods Group) founded the company in 1995 along with his wife, Carol Stewart. Creekstone Farms is also co-owned by Sun Capital Partners. The majority of their distributors are not chains, but Publix does distribute their products in some states.
Creekstone Farms is most well known for its attempt to test all of its beef for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, or "mad cow disease"). At a cost of about half a million dollars, Creekstone built a testing lab, the first inside a U. S. meat packing plant, and hired the necessary personnel. In 2004, however, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which controls the sale of testing kits, refused to sell Creekstone enough to test all of its cows.
The USDA's stated position was that allowing any meatpacking company to test every cow would undermine the agency's official position that random testing was scientifically adequate to assure safety. The USDA also claims that testing does not ensure food safety because the disease is difficult to detect in younger animals. An alternative position is that the USDA's objection is the result of pressure from larger meatpacking operations. The president of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association told the Washington Post that "If testing is allowed at Creekstone, we think it would become the international standard and the domestic standard, too." Creekstone Farms says tests cost about $20 per animal, increasing the cost of beef by about 10 cents per pound. The USDA currently tests about 1 percent of cattle slaughtered in the U.S.
In March 2006, Creekstone launched a lawsuit against the USDA for refusing to allow complete testing. On March 29, 2007, Judges James Robertson of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that USDA cannot lawfully prevent Creekstone from testing its cattle for BSE. USDA's appeal of that decision to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is pending.
The company reports that Japan's ban on U.S. beef beginning in 2003 caused the company to lose a third of its sales, prompting the layoff of about 150 people.
