The U.S. will import Mexican cattle again. Here's what that means for high beef prices.

By Myra P. Saefong

Why consumers might not see relief from high beef prices until 2028

The U.S. Agriculture Department is planning to reopen U.S. borders to Mexican cattle as domestic beef prices at the grocery store hover near record highs.

The U.S. Agriculture Department will allow cattle imports from Mexico for the first time in more than a year beginning in late August, even as New World screwworm remains a threat to domestic livestock.

The easing of cattle crossings at the southern border could help the U.S. offset low herd counts that in January were pegged at a 75-year low. But consumers paying nearly record-high prices for beef won't see immediate relief at the grocery store.

The U-turn from the USDA comes less than two months after the agency confirmed the U.S. presence of New World screwworm for the first time since the 1960s.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told CNBC in June that the department's focus was on a containment. "It's an all-hands-on-deck [situation]," she said, adding that the U.S. was boosting its sterile-fly program that had eradicated screwworm previously. "We will be at the point where we're going to start being able to push back, hopefully, within a couple of months."

Rollins, in a social-media post this week, pointed to a drop in new screwworm cases in July as a sign that containment and the sterile-fly efforts were helping contain the outbreak.

Mackenzie Johnston, a fifth-generation cattle rancher in Nebraska and a content director at AgMarket.Net-owned commodity brokerage Standard Grain, said she's almost certain the Trump administration decided to reopen the border to cattle imports in an effort to lower retail beef prices.

The USDA said Friday it will conditionally reopen southern U.S. ports to Mexican cattle starting Aug. 24 because it is now "safe to reopen" the port at Douglas, Ariz. - which borders Sonora, Mexico's second-largest state - to "resume the hundreds-year-old movement of cattle."

When MarketWatch asked the USDA why it's now allowing imports of Mexican cattle despite the ongoing threat of screwworm, a flesh-eating parasite, it declined to comment beyond Friday's press release.

Two of Mexico's states, Sonora and Chihuahua, have a "track record of success" in being able to stop the spread of screwworm, the USDA press release said, adding that it remains confident those states can continue to do the job.

The USDA's release didn't mention nearly record-high prices for beef in its announcement.

The U.S. city average price for ground beef was at a record high of $6.899 a pound in April.

For consumers, "a full reopening and return to normal Mexican cattle import flows is probably the fastest lever available to help beef supplies," said David Maloni, senior director of commodities at ArrowStream, a food-service supply-chain data platform. Yet Maloni said he isn't expecting "meaningful relief for consumers until 2028 at the earliest."

Johnston, the cattle rancher from Nebraska, said "the administration will stop at nothing to try to lower prices" - even if it could potentially hurt the ranchers who helped put President Donald Trump in office. It's all about the coming midterm elections in November, she added.

A spokesperson from the White House disputed that claim. "President Trump's administration has simultaneously implemented policies that drive economic prosperity while protecting the United States from New World Screwworm," spokeswoman Anna Kelly told MarketWatch.

The USDA, when asked for comment on the rancher's claim, referred MarketWatch to Rollins' statement when announcing the reopening of livestock trade at the southern ports. "Protecting the United States from NWS and pushing this pest out of Mexico and back to the Darien Gap is a top priority at USDA and has the full attention of the Trump Administration," Rollins said at the time.

Still, the USDA isn't opening the floodgates to cattle from Mexico. "To even make a dent in the record-high beef prices consumers are facing, we'd have to see a tidal wave of cattle come into the U.S., and that's not going to be the case," Johnston told MarketWatch. She pointed to only one port that's set to reopen right away and two others to follow in the near future.

Tight supply and a phased reopen

U.S. imports of Mexican cattle have been suspended since May 11, 2025 because of the rapid spread of screwworm in Mexico at the time. U.S. cattle imports from Mexico had totaled 1.25 million head back in 2024, according to the USDA.

The "phased" nature of the reopening of southern ports to Mexican cattle is expected to significantly limit how many cattle actually flow into the U.S. in the near term, said Maloni at ArrowStream.

A full resumption and return to normal import volumes may not happen until late 2027, he said. Maloni also doesn't expect the resumption of cattle imports from Mexico to ease retail beef prices soon.

The U.S. cattle herd will eventually build back up, and there will be more supply of beef and prices will come down, said Johnston, the Nebraska rancher. "But right now, that isn't the case."

Who benefits

Consumers won't benefit much immediately from the move to reopen some borders with Mexico for cattle imports, but there is one part of the industry that will: U.S. feedlots where cattle are fattened up before slaughter.

In the more immediate future, feedlots in Texas and California will have more cattle to "stay in business," and eventually processing plants also will have more cattle, which also helps their business, said Kevin Kester, a rancher from Parkfield, Calif., and a former president of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association.

Cattle herds in the U.S. have dropped dramatically in the past two decades, falling to about about 94 million head in 2026 from closer to 105 million in 2006. Of this year's total, close to 12% of all U.S. cattle and calves were in large feedlots, USDA data show.

The U.S. cattle market was valued at about $113 billion in 2024, based on gross revenue ranchers received from cattle sales.

On the futures market, cattle prices closed lower Monday, partly in reaction to the USDA news and also to recent data showing a slight increase in the U.S. cattle herd, said ArrowStream's Maloni. On Monday, the September contract for feeder cattle (FCU26) - those that are fattened up for slaughter - fell 2.8% to end at $3.32 per pound in Chicago. Prices inched higher Tuesday.

Price declines will "undoubtedly hurt" the cattle market in the near term, said Johnston. "It couldn't come at a worse time, as a lot of producers will be selling their calves over the next few months."

-Myra P. Saefong

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07-28-26 1520ET