Sustainability in the Beef Industry
Get a glimpse into The Nature Conservancy's U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef collaboration.
For more than a decade, the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef (USRSB) has brought together stakeholders from across the value chain to advance continuous improvement in sustainable beef production. As a founding member, The Nature Conservancy is playing an active role in this effort. Our experts hold key leadership positions and have been instrumental in shaping USRSB’s sustainability framework.
Recently, TNC helped lead the revision of USRSB’s strategic plan, which, as a result, aligns with our 2030 Goals and ensures that industry priorities support large-scale conservation outcomes. This alignment positions all beef value chain sectors to positively influence the management and ecological health of millions of grazing land acres. By working within this system, we are helping to accelerate adoption of grazing practices that improve biodiversity and sustain rural economies.
Through our engagement with USRSB, TNC is collaborating with industry leaders from every sector of the value chain to ensure that conservation is embedded in procurement standards, certification programs, and other value chain functions. Together, we are creating market-driven incentives that make sustainable grazing the standard for beef producers.
Q & A with Nancy Labbe
Nancy Labbe—TNC’s North America Regenerative Grazing Lands co-director and board chair of the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef—explains how industry leadership is turning sustainability goals into real-world impact.
nature.org: How does your leadership at USRSB strengthen TNC’s efforts to scale regenerative grazing principles?
Nancy Labbe: As USRSB chair, I get to sit at the table with industry leaders and weave TNC’s science-based approach to biodiversity into meaningful, forward-looking conversations. It’s a unique opportunity to align conservation priorities with business realities, ensuring that regenerative grazing isn’t just an aspiration, but a practical, scalable solution embedded in the supply chain.
nature.org: Why is TNC’s involvement in USRSB critical for driving sustainability across the beef supply chain?
Nancy Labbe: The beef value chain is vast and interconnected, and we must collaborate along every link in the chain—from ranchers to retailers—if we are going to improve the ecological and agronomic health of large landscapes. This is why TNC is helping USRSB set ecological health standards and frameworks that are measurable, actionable, and economically beneficial across millions of grazing land acres.
Quote: Nancy Labbe
The beef supply chain is vast and interconnected, and we must collaborate along every link in the chain—from ranchers to retailers—if we are going to improve the ecological and agronomic health of large landscapes.
nature.org: What specific initiatives within USRSB are helping advance regenerative principles and grassland health?
Nancy Labbe: Through USRSB, TNC has championed efforts that directly support grazing practices that are ecologically beneficial. For example, with TNC's support, USRSB launched the first nationwide baseline survey to understand how ranchers are using grazing management plans—a critical step toward improving grazing land ecosystem health and ranch economic viability. USRSB has started assessing the loss of native grazing lands caused by tillage agriculture and other forms of development to better inform strategies for protecting these critical habitats Both efforts will help ranchers keep grazing lands intact and healthy, while delivering ecological and economic benefits.
nature.org: How does collaboration with USRSB create incentives for companies to adopt regenerative grazing principles?
Nancy Labbe: Companies want assurances that their sustainability commitments deliver real, measurable impacts—impacts they can confidently promise and communicate to consumers. Through USRSB, we’re advancing standards, transparency, and verification processes, so businesses can confidently invest in regenerative management and its environmental and economic benefits. This alignment turns sustainability at the ranch level into a competitive advantage.
nature.org: What role does USRSB play in aligning industry goals with TNC’s 2030 conservation targets?
Nancy Labbe: USRSB is a forum for collaboration among all beef value chain sectors—ranchers, feeders, processors, wholesalers, retailers, and food service providers—leveraging the industry’s economic and logistical influence to drive improvements in grazing practices. Those improvements, primarily driven by a combination of technical assistance, peer to peer learning, and producer education and outreach. Include TNC's 2030 goal of implementing ecologically sound grazing management plans across more than a quarter-billion acres in the U.S.—a goal also reflected in the USRSB strategic plan.
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