Japan moving to ease BSE testing
By Richard Hanson
DTN Japan Correspondent
TOKYO (DTN)--In what may turn out to be a major initiative to ease Japan's domestic "test all" cows BSE policy--a major stumbling block to reviving U.S. beef exports--a government panel is expected to recommend excluding from the tests cows aged 20 months of age or younger.
That prospect arose on July 8 after a press report said the Japanese government "is inclined to change its stance on testing for bovine spongiform encephalopathy in a manner that may pave the way for resuming imports of beef from the United States." The first question was, who leaked the story?
A government source told DTN that an experts' study committee of the Cabinet Office-level Food Safety Commission (FSC) is expected to make an "informal" decision to lift the testing requirement on the younger domestic cattle in a week or so. Whoever did the leaking knew what was being discussed by the FSC, which has just celebrated its first year since it was created on July 1, 2003 to lord over policy questions, including what to do about the government BSE policy.
The deliberations of the FSC are expected to lead to a government policy change by the time a high-level meeting of U.S. and Japanese government officials in August (at which the FSC has "observer" status).
Implementing such a policy will take some time, the source cautions. But the thinking is to present the change as a step forward later this month in Tokyo to the third (and last) meeting of a U.S.-Japan "Working Group" on BSE-related issues. A final date for that meeting has yet to be announced, but it is likely to be after July 20. The two sides have just been through three days of negotiation in late June in Fort Collins, Colo. At those talks, Japanese officials conceded publicly that testing all cows regardless of age was not the best policy. At that time, Japan stopped short of making any new commitments on the question easing up on the testing of younger cows.
The new scenario, if all goes well, could mean a partial resumption of U.S. exports to Japan as early as November or December, a government expert reckons. That will be just about one whole year after the disclosure of America's first BSE case halted all U.S. beef exports, including the shutdown of Japan as America's biggest overseas market for beef.
There are still a number of hurdles, however.
First, there may be public resistance to such a move. Japanese consumers have grown accustomed to eating domestic-grown beef with a government stamp verifying the cattle was tested for BSE. The "test all" policy alone found nine confirmed cases of BSE (two other sick cows were confirmed BSE-infected through other tests, for a total of 11 cases).
Another question: How is the age of a U.S. cow determined? U.S. beef producers lack a uniform identification system to verify age. Generally speaking, U.S. cattle are slaughtered for consumption around 2 years (say 18 to 24 months). It is estimated that 80 percent of U.S. cattle are slaughtered by 20 months of age. But calculating age by looking at the teeth remains a standard practice and only marks cows 30 months or older.
Europe generally does not test cows younger than 30 months.
Those considerations seem to be less important than re-starting the flow of U.S. beef exports. That, after all, is the agreement that the two countries made in high-level talks in April. At the time, mad cow relations between the U.S. and Japan had reached rock bottom, with no official talks between the two since late January.
Date: 7/29/04
Copyright 1995-2010. High Plains Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Any republishing of these pages, including electronic reproduction of the editorial archives or classified advertising, is strictly prohibited. If you have questions or comments you can reach us at High Plains Journal 1500 E. Wyatt Earp Blvd., P.O. Box 760, Dodge City, KS 67801 or call 1-800-452-7171. Email: webmaster@hpj.com
Market Snapshot
Inside Futures