Japanese Safety Board Clears U.S. Beef for Importation

By Barry Shlachter, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas

Dec. 9–American beef edged closer to the highly profitable Japanese market after a two-year ban Thursday when Japan’s food safety commission unanimously declared that meat from U.S. cattle 20 months or younger is safe from mad-cow disease.

The prolonged import ban has been a major irritant in relations between the two otherwise friendly nations.

The Food Safety Commission’s findings go to the health and agriculture ministries, which will make a final recommendation to the government, The Associated Press said. It quoted Japanese media reports as saying the Cabinet could decide to lift the U.S. beef ban as early as Dec. 12.

The “Asahi Shimbun,” one of the country’s leading newspapers, earlier in the week quoted government sources as saying the first shipments of American beef cuts could be in Japanese meat counters by late this month.

“Much of the approval is dependent on a promise between two countries,” said Masaaki Terada, commission chairman. “It’s a question of trust.” The commission also found beef from younger Canadian cows safe, The AP added.

Japan had been the biggest export market for U.S. beef, amounting to revenues of $1.4 billion in 2003. Through that year, about 7 percent of U.S. beef products were exported, slightly less than a third by volume bought by Japan, whose domestically produced beef is far more expensive.

Resumed shipments could help maintain what have been favorable prices for U.S. ranchers.

“We’ve enjoyed a pretty doggone good market this year, but we can’t sustain it without the right trading rules yet and we’re not there yet,” said Matt Brockman, executive vice president of the Fort Worth-based Texas and Southwestern Cattleraisers Association. “This is a good start.”

Brockman and other industry officials said some hurdles still needed to be cleared before shipments again reach the 2003 level now that much market share has been grabbed by cheaper Australian cuts. “I don’t see us getting back to that point in six months,” Brockman said, citing the 20-month rule and other factors.

Few U.S. producers understand the record-keeping required to have their cattle accepted for the Japanese market.

“Supply for that market is quite limited,” said Bruce Cobb, general manager of Amarillo-based Consolidated Beef Producers, a co-op of more than 200 cattle feedlots in Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas. “Not enough producers have gone through the certification process.”

And many Japanese still harbor concerns about the safety of American beef. An “Asahi” survey in October found 67 percent of Japanese respondents saying they would not eat U.S. beef if the ban were lifted.

The ban followed the first U.S. case of mad cow, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, in December 2003. The discovery of a diseased Canadian-born dairy cow in Washington state led Japan and scores of other countries to ban imports of U.S. beef. Another case was found in 2004. Japan itself has had more than 20 BSE cases, heightening public concern and prompting testing on every head of cattle slaughtered domestically.

Some Japanese have criticized the move to lift the ban, claiming the government was kowtowing to U.S. pressure, the paper said.

Tokyo dropped its demand that every U.S. head of cattle destined for the Japanese market be tested for BSE. But it succeeded in getting Washington’s agreement that each animal’s age be verified through certifiable records or proven through grading, said Lynn Heinze, a spokesman for the U.S. Meat Export Federation. Moreover, Japanese inspection teams would be permitted to observe U.S. slaughter plant operations, he said.

Heinze estimated that only a small percentage of cattle would now meet the Japanese guidelines.

“The bulk of (North Texas) producers do not know what those requirements are,” said Ron Gill, a beef expert with the Texas Cooperative Extension system.

“It’s not difficult,” Gill went on. “It’s a matter of knowing you have to keep the records, and then doing it.” And even if the required records already are being kept, the rancher has to show that he has undergone training to keep such paperwork, he said.

The good news, Heinze said, is that the Japanese will likely buy 29 different cuts of beef, up from 12 before. One of the traditional Japanese cuts, tongue, fetches less than a dollar a pound retail in the United States but sells for $20 in a Tokyto butcher’s shop, he noted.

In March, Fort Worth-based Superior Livestock Auction began a program offering source- and age-verification cattle that general manager Jim Kelly said should meet Japanese requirements.

“This should give a leg up for someone buying cattle to put in a feedlot for the Japanese market,” said Kelly, whose company sells about 2 million cattle a year through 50 satellite-relayed auctions from the Stockyards’ Exchange Building.

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