September 08, 2004
Japanese Ban on U.S. Beef Imports
Yesterday, Japan’s Agriculture Minister, Yoshiyuki Kamei stated at a press conference that, contingent upon the outcome of a Thursday meeting of the Cabinet Office’s Food Safety Commission (FSC), the Government of Japan (GOJ) might reconsider its position on the testing of all beef cattle for BSE. Kamei’s remarks have begun to generate some speculation in the media that should the GOJ agree that testing young cattle is unnecessary, then there might also follow a change in the government’s stance towards reopening domestic markets to U.S. imports.
In related news, The Daily Yomiuri reported today that Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda indicated at a press conference that the issue of beef imports will be on the agenda at the September 21st meeting between the two heads of state (although Kamei claimed not to know anything about the agenda in the aforementioned press conference). The news was not all positive however, as the article went on to note that serious issues remain and could stall progress on the talks. Most interesting perhaps, are concerns inside Ministry of Agriculture, Foresty, and Fisheries (MAFF) that resumption of imports could be perceived inside Japan as yielding to U.S. Government (USG) pressure in the run-up to November presidential elections, while disregarding public safety.
What this all means for the future of U.S. beef exports to Japan still remains to be seen. The combination of statements made by both Kamei and Hosoda could signal that the government is setting the stage for at least the partial reopening of its markets sometime later this year. Much of the debate now seems to be centering around the appropriate age of cattle that should require testing, with the Japanese currently for 20 months and the Americans insisting on 24 months.
The Japanese position is supported by their claim that in a test on 3 million cows, the youngest age of infection was 21 months. The most likely reason for this is that abnormal prion protein (see background info below) is difficult to detect in young cows because the disease has not had time to run its destructive course. Therefore, the meat of young cows should be safe to eat – the problem remaining is, “how young?” Back in July of this year, both parties reached a tentative agreement to begin working towards partial reopening of imports on the meat of young cows, so the fact that there is now disagreement on the appropriate age might be interpreted as a step in the right direction.
That said, there is a high likelihood that the attitude of MAFF is an overreaction for which there is little scientific, and considerably more economic/political, justification. First, consider the scientific side of the situation. U.S. laws passed in 1997 and in January of 2004 outlaw the feeding of proteins (bone and blood meal) of ruminants to other ruminants, as well as the inclusion of beef blood or beef fat in feed for calves. Because BSE is believed to be passed from animal to animal through contaminated feed products, the passage of the latter of these laws should have closed the door on BSE outbreaks within the United States.
No matter how disgusting one might find the feeding practices of the U.S. meat industry to be (full disclosure: the author wholeheartedly agree that they are indeed disgusting), without a specific case where a ruminant has succumbed to BSE or some other such dehabilitating and potentially dangerous disease to humans as a result of consuming non-ruminant protein, there is scant evidence that U.S. beef is a threat. Besides, if not a single one of the countries that implemented the ban in 2003 seemed to have a problem with these feeding practices before, why should they find fault with it after inclusion of the dangerous ingredients have been eliminated? (Never mind that there have been no repeat cases and few Americans seem bothered by the prospect of having their brains spongeified.)
As for the economics/politics of the matter, it’s no secret that concern over food safety (though sometimes justified) is a favorite tool for blocking foreign produce and livestock not only in Japan, but around the world. The upshot of this, without going into any of the potentially boring detail, is that domestic producers are protected while consumers and Japanese restaurants quite literally pay the price.
Perhaps the most visible example of this is the Japanese fast-food chain Yoshinoya, which earlier this year had to stop selling its trademark gyudon(beef bowls) due its 99% reliance on U.S. beef. While it's difficult to say how Japanese consumers as a whole feel about the matter, many are not happy. It angered at least one man so badly when he was told "no more gyudon" that he became violent and began swinging at the clerk behind the counter in one Yoshinoya. It’s easier to see the effect the beef ban has had on the restaurant chain itself. According to the Asahi, in July Yoishinoya’s year-on-year, same store sales were down 35.3%, the fourth consecutive month in which year on year sales had fallen below the 30% mark.
It’s quite easy for MAFF and others who favor protectionism to hide behind the food safety excuse and demand that U.S. producers test 100 percent of their cattle, but because of the sheer number of cattle slaughtered in the United States each year, this is an impossible demand and everyone knows it. That’s why MAFF can fearlessly continue to insist upon it. To the best of my knowledge, Australia doesn’t test 100 percent of its cattle, yet Japanese consumers and the government were more than happy to import from them to make up for the shortfall.
And as an added bonus, whenever the Japanese government does finally decide to reopen U.S. imports, Japanese consumers can probably expect to pay a little extra for the imports. Because of a special type of tariff in place on beef imports in Japan (yes, it’s WTO legal), the likely surge in beef imports will trigger a special kind of tariff. The tariff was intended to protect the domestic Japanese meat industry from a sudden and unexpected surge of cheap foreign imports. But there would be nothing sudden or unexpected about this spike; it would simply indicate that Japanese consumption of imported beef had returned to pre-BSE-scare levels.
(Background Information: Japan has maintained a ban on U.S. beef imports since late December 2003, when a cow imported to the United States from Canada tested positive for BSE. One prerequisite for reopening their markets was that U.S. beef producers conduct infinitively costly tests on all cattle to ensure product safety, something already carried out by Japanese beef producers on the relatively small number of cattle raised for consumption inside the country.
The USG has unofficially asked GOJ to exclude cattle under 24 months of age, because according to U.S. tests, BSE symptoms are nearly impossible to detect through testing of animals younger than 30 months. And although the US and Japan did agree in July that current tests were unlikely to detect abnormal prion protein [the presence of which is considered an indication of infection] in younger cattle, Japan has so far refused to budge on its position that all cattle be tested.
Japan was one of more than 20 countries that implemented an import ban in December 2003. According to the National Cattleman’s Beef Association, U.S. beef exports in 2003 reached a record $3.86 billion in 2003 and some 88.3 percent of these exports went to Japan, Mexico, South Korea, and Canada, all of which did implement and still maintain an import ban. Nevertheless, as of June 2004, 31% of exports had been restored as a result of other countries reopening their markets.
Australian exports of beef have skyrocketed since Japan’s ban reaching a new record high in 2004. Australia has also gone one step further than the United States in its ban on ruminant feed. Since 1997 use of ruminant blood or bone meal in the feed products of other ruminants was outlawed, and this was extended in 1999 to include all animal meal excluding blood meal, which was banned two years later in 2001. Japan also banned use of ruminant meat and bone meal in cattle feed products in September 2001.
In related news, The Daily Yomiuri reported today that Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda indicated at a press conference that the issue of beef imports will be on the agenda at the September 21st meeting between the two heads of state (although Kamei claimed not to know anything about the agenda in the aforementioned press conference). The news was not all positive however, as the article went on to note that serious issues remain and could stall progress on the talks. Most interesting perhaps, are concerns inside Ministry of Agriculture, Foresty, and Fisheries (MAFF) that resumption of imports could be perceived inside Japan as yielding to U.S. Government (USG) pressure in the run-up to November presidential elections, while disregarding public safety.
What this all means for the future of U.S. beef exports to Japan still remains to be seen. The combination of statements made by both Kamei and Hosoda could signal that the government is setting the stage for at least the partial reopening of its markets sometime later this year. Much of the debate now seems to be centering around the appropriate age of cattle that should require testing, with the Japanese currently for 20 months and the Americans insisting on 24 months.
The Japanese position is supported by their claim that in a test on 3 million cows, the youngest age of infection was 21 months. The most likely reason for this is that abnormal prion protein (see background info below) is difficult to detect in young cows because the disease has not had time to run its destructive course. Therefore, the meat of young cows should be safe to eat – the problem remaining is, “how young?” Back in July of this year, both parties reached a tentative agreement to begin working towards partial reopening of imports on the meat of young cows, so the fact that there is now disagreement on the appropriate age might be interpreted as a step in the right direction.
That said, there is a high likelihood that the attitude of MAFF is an overreaction for which there is little scientific, and considerably more economic/political, justification. First, consider the scientific side of the situation. U.S. laws passed in 1997 and in January of 2004 outlaw the feeding of proteins (bone and blood meal) of ruminants to other ruminants, as well as the inclusion of beef blood or beef fat in feed for calves. Because BSE is believed to be passed from animal to animal through contaminated feed products, the passage of the latter of these laws should have closed the door on BSE outbreaks within the United States.
No matter how disgusting one might find the feeding practices of the U.S. meat industry to be (full disclosure: the author wholeheartedly agree that they are indeed disgusting), without a specific case where a ruminant has succumbed to BSE or some other such dehabilitating and potentially dangerous disease to humans as a result of consuming non-ruminant protein, there is scant evidence that U.S. beef is a threat. Besides, if not a single one of the countries that implemented the ban in 2003 seemed to have a problem with these feeding practices before, why should they find fault with it after inclusion of the dangerous ingredients have been eliminated? (Never mind that there have been no repeat cases and few Americans seem bothered by the prospect of having their brains spongeified.)
As for the economics/politics of the matter, it’s no secret that concern over food safety (though sometimes justified) is a favorite tool for blocking foreign produce and livestock not only in Japan, but around the world. The upshot of this, without going into any of the potentially boring detail, is that domestic producers are protected while consumers and Japanese restaurants quite literally pay the price.
Perhaps the most visible example of this is the Japanese fast-food chain Yoshinoya, which earlier this year had to stop selling its trademark gyudon(beef bowls) due its 99% reliance on U.S. beef. While it's difficult to say how Japanese consumers as a whole feel about the matter, many are not happy. It angered at least one man so badly when he was told "no more gyudon" that he became violent and began swinging at the clerk behind the counter in one Yoshinoya. It’s easier to see the effect the beef ban has had on the restaurant chain itself. According to the Asahi, in July Yoishinoya’s year-on-year, same store sales were down 35.3%, the fourth consecutive month in which year on year sales had fallen below the 30% mark.
It’s quite easy for MAFF and others who favor protectionism to hide behind the food safety excuse and demand that U.S. producers test 100 percent of their cattle, but because of the sheer number of cattle slaughtered in the United States each year, this is an impossible demand and everyone knows it. That’s why MAFF can fearlessly continue to insist upon it. To the best of my knowledge, Australia doesn’t test 100 percent of its cattle, yet Japanese consumers and the government were more than happy to import from them to make up for the shortfall.
And as an added bonus, whenever the Japanese government does finally decide to reopen U.S. imports, Japanese consumers can probably expect to pay a little extra for the imports. Because of a special type of tariff in place on beef imports in Japan (yes, it’s WTO legal), the likely surge in beef imports will trigger a special kind of tariff. The tariff was intended to protect the domestic Japanese meat industry from a sudden and unexpected surge of cheap foreign imports. But there would be nothing sudden or unexpected about this spike; it would simply indicate that Japanese consumption of imported beef had returned to pre-BSE-scare levels.
(Background Information: Japan has maintained a ban on U.S. beef imports since late December 2003, when a cow imported to the United States from Canada tested positive for BSE. One prerequisite for reopening their markets was that U.S. beef producers conduct infinitively costly tests on all cattle to ensure product safety, something already carried out by Japanese beef producers on the relatively small number of cattle raised for consumption inside the country.
The USG has unofficially asked GOJ to exclude cattle under 24 months of age, because according to U.S. tests, BSE symptoms are nearly impossible to detect through testing of animals younger than 30 months. And although the US and Japan did agree in July that current tests were unlikely to detect abnormal prion protein [the presence of which is considered an indication of infection] in younger cattle, Japan has so far refused to budge on its position that all cattle be tested.
Japan was one of more than 20 countries that implemented an import ban in December 2003. According to the National Cattleman’s Beef Association, U.S. beef exports in 2003 reached a record $3.86 billion in 2003 and some 88.3 percent of these exports went to Japan, Mexico, South Korea, and Canada, all of which did implement and still maintain an import ban. Nevertheless, as of June 2004, 31% of exports had been restored as a result of other countries reopening their markets.
Australian exports of beef have skyrocketed since Japan’s ban reaching a new record high in 2004. Australia has also gone one step further than the United States in its ban on ruminant feed. Since 1997 use of ruminant blood or bone meal in the feed products of other ruminants was outlawed, and this was extended in 1999 to include all animal meal excluding blood meal, which was banned two years later in 2001. Japan also banned use of ruminant meat and bone meal in cattle feed products in September 2001.
# posted by Saru : 9:10 PM
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In the case of Yoshinoya, they couldn't use other countries beef because their supply was almost entirely (99% I think) U.S. beef, a fact they had been all to happy to let everyone know during the domestic beef scare that followed the mad cow outbreak back in September 2001. I would imagine that there was limited supply, at least in the short run in Australia, so increasing imports of Aussie beef to replace the decline in U.S. beef was probably not possible. I'm not certain that this explains it, but is sounds plausable.
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