manufactured · input

Raw Cattle Hides (Green Hides)

Unsalted or salt-cured fresh cattle hides from beef slaughterhouses. Primary raw material for leather tanning. US beef packing produces approximately 25-30 million hides per year. End applications: automotive leather (each vehicle interior requires 8-12 hides), furniture, footwear, fashion goods. Hide supply is structurally coupled to beef slaughter volumes. Major exporters: US, Australia, Brazil.

Source countries

Companies

Goods affected

Claims on record

What depends on it

Goods that need this input

1 essential American goods rely on raw cattle hides (green hides) somewhere upstream in their supply chain.

Materials

Footwear

Sneakers, dress shoes, and boots; ~99% imported, overwhelmingly from Vietnam, China, Indonesia, and Cambodia.

Where it comes from

Source countries

Share of global supply, by country.

Country	Share of supply
AUAustralia	28%
USUnited States	25%
BRBrazil	20%
ARArgentina	10%
NZNew Zealand	5%

Who makes it

Supplier companies

4 companies produce raw cattle hides (green hides).

JBS USA (JBS S.A.)

HQ US25% share

US subsidiary of JBS S.A. (Brazil) — the world's largest protein company. JBS USA handles beef (Greeley CO, Cactus TX, Grand Island NE, Hyrum UT) and pork (Worthington MN, Marshalltown IA). ~20% of US beef packing. JBS S.A. controlled by the Batista family, who pled guilty to massive bribery of Brazilian officials in 2017 (Operação Carne Fraca / Operation Weak Flesh); JBS paid $3.2B in leniency agreement. The US Justice Department separately resolved JBS USA-related corruption charges in 2020. JBS is simultaneously a major US food infrastructure company and the subject of one of Brazil's largest corporate corruption cases.

Tyson Foods

HQ US22% share

Largest US meat company by revenue (~$52B in FY2024); world's second-largest chicken producer. Processes beef, pork, and chicken. Key brands: Jimmy Dean, Hillshire Farm, Ball Park, State Fair, Tyson. ~20% of US beef processing; ~15% of US pork processing. Holcomb, KS plant (6,000 cattle/day, 5-6% of US beef) suffered a catastrophic fire in August 2019, shutting down for ~5 months. Dakota City, NE is one of the world's largest pork plants. Tyson is also closing multiple US chicken plants and moving production to lower-cost markets.

Cargill Beef

HQ US18% share

Third-largest US beef packer (~18% of US beef processing). Major hide-generating facilities in Schuyler NE (~4,800 head/day) and Fort Morgan CO (~4,000 head/day, undergoing $90M automation upgrade). Cargill closed its Milwaukee plant early 2026 as US cattle inventory hit 73-year low. Part of Cargill Inc. (largest private company in the US by revenue).

National Beef Packing Company

HQ US10% share

4th largest US beef packer; ~10-12% of US beef processing. Major plants at Liberal, KS (one of the largest US beef plants) and Dodge City, KS. Owned by Marfrig Global Foods (Brazil) — the world's 4th largest beef company. Two of the US's Big 4 beef packers (JBS, National Beef) are owned by Brazilian companies; together with Cargill (US, private), they process ~85% of US beef. National Beef also owns Kansas City Steak Company (premium retail) and Bravada International (tallow/technical products).

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