Mexico seeks to offset screwworm impact by increasing US beef exports

Mexico's main meat industry group said on Tuesday it aims to double beef exports to the United States next year, seeking to offset losses from a border closure triggered by a screwworm outbreak that continues to ‌paralyze livestock trade. In the first four months of the year, Mexican beef exports to the U.S. increased by about 23% according to officials of the Mexican Meat Chamber, who said fresh meat accounts for most of what is exported.

In 2025, beef exports to the U.S. rose 10.6% to be worth about $2.3 billion, ‌according to the chamber's data. "We've increased it...if it can be doubled, that would be excellent," Macarena Hernandez, the chamber's general director, told Reuters at ‌a chamber event. The U.S. border has been closed to Mexican livestock for about a year as Mexico works to contain an outbreak of the flesh-eating screwworm parasite, which has spread northward from Central America, rattling the livestock and beef industries of both the U.S. and Mexico. The disruption has forced a fundamental, and costly, pivot across Mexico's cattle sector, as ranchers who would ⁠normally ship ​live animals north scramble to hold, ⁠feed and eventually process them domestically for export as beef, which is typically an 18-month process.

Producers are having "to keep those animals, feed them, have the space and supplies" to sustain them, ⁠said Hernandez. The border closure has resulted in losses of about $1.8 billion for Mexico's livestock sector, the chamber said. Though exporting beef that is slaughtered and processed in Mexico - as ​opposed to livestock - offers an alternative outlet, volumes remain small because the shift is just beginning, she said.

Mexico has registered 25,107 cases of ⁠screwworm since November 2024, according to government data through May 17, underscoring the scale of the outbreak as authorities continue to grapple with its spread. Of those, 1,190 cases remain active. While the ⁠southern ​state of Chiapas continues to report the highest overall caseload, the geographic pattern of the outbreak has shifted, with Veracruz and Puebla now accounting for the largest concentrations of active infections. Cases in dogs have also increased, and the government reported an infection confirmed in a dog in Mexico City ⁠in April.

Mexico, in coordination with U.S. officials, disperses sterile flies across northern states including Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon and San Luis Potosí, as well as in ⁠a buffer zone stretching about 89 kilometers (55 ⁠miles) south of Texas, part of efforts to halt the northward spread of the screwworm outbreak. A key pillar of Mexico's strategy is a new sterile fly production plant in Metapa, Chiapas, which the government said last month ‌is about 75% complete ‌and expected to begin operating by the end of June.

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