Alberta beef entering Costco’s Costco market where US cuts once again reigned supreme
Alberta Beef is now available at Your Local Costco – Mexico.
Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Heath Macdonald was on hand for a full pipe cutting ceremony in front of Porterhouse, New York Prime and other cuts of Alberta Beef at Upscale Pork just west of Mexico City.
“Days like today open doors for the future and we’re just going to see this growth, without a doubt,” said Macdonald, in an interview with CBC News following the event.
“The partnership is there, you can see it, you can see it and you can feel it.”
A recent deal between JBS Canada and Costco Mexico is already seeing nearly 20,000 tons of beef, processed on trails, in Alta.
Salvador Hernandez, director of JBS Mexico, said the Cotsco deal provided Canadian beef with a “new frontier” in a market dominated by US beef.
“Today marks an important milestone, not just for JBS, but for the entire North American Beef industry,” he said.
It took about a year for JBS Canada to negotiate the deal, which involved bringing Mexican trade officials to visit a processing plant in Brooks, Accondi in Mexico and Latin America for Canada’s Canadian beef group.
“Costco is the standard of quality in Mexico. We’ve been looking for this for a long time and Coskco finally opened its doors,” said Herrera-Blanc.
New, ungrounded cattle are exported from Canada to Mexico and covered by the Canada-US-Mexico (Cusma) agreement.
Canadian Pet Food Banped
Alberta Prime joins other Canadian products on Costco’s Mexican shelves, including maple syrup, rolled oats, ice wine and chicken nuggets. An official with a grocery store where the beef announcement was located said that about $60,000 US (or $84,000 CDN) was sold in a week.
Wednesday’s announcement was the second meat-related win in Canada by Canadian producers since MacDonald arrived for a week of meetings in Mexico.
Following a meeting on Tuesday between MacDonald and the Secretary of Agriculture and Rural Affairs In Julio Berdegué Sacristán, the Mexican Cabinet announced that his country will be lifting its 18-month ban on imports of beef products from Canada.
“I told the Minister that at any time, we will accept a protocol to facilitate the importation of food for domestic animals so that their families can feed their small animals with the highest quality food,” said Bherdegué Distristán.
Mexico does not produce enough pet food to meet domestic demand. Mexico imported approx $402.7 million The most important pet food in 2024. Canada currently has a market share of 0.5 percent in the country, according to Agriculture Canada.
MacDonald said that the negotiations of his mexicanrart of Mexico also include the introduction of digital phytosand certificates to avoid any caps on the sale of organic products such as organic and canola.
“It can have a big impact on how quickly we can sell,” he said.
Phytosanity certificates are issued by the exporting country to the importing country to ensure that organic products are disease-free and meet the country’s import regulations.
“People want to do business and they want to build relationships, they want to be different,” Macdonald said.
MacDonald is in Mexico for a series of meetings, including a trip to the city of Guadalajara, Jalisco state, until Friday.
