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US to beef up the mad cow
fight
By Richard Hanson
WASHINGTON, November 30, 2001 - The US
Department of Agriculture today released a landmark
study by Harvard University ... based on three years of
thorough study, we are firmly confident that BSE [bovine
spongiform encephalopathy] will not become an animal or
public health problem in America.
-
Statement issued soon after Japan officially became
Asia's first mad cow disease country in September
2001
TOKYO - BSE has become an animal
and public-health problem in the United States. Maybe
just in the nick of time.
Just ask a dead mad
cow - any of Japan's nine victims and Canada's first and
now the United States' first (with some Canadian
connections), not to mention the thousands of other
victims in Europe.
At last, the US, with more
cows than anyone else, has become part of the problem, a
large step perhaps toward a more rational view of a
disease that has been described as a sort of "bovine
terrorism, the perfect pathogen".
With the US on
board - and after passing through a short period of
denial - the world might be willing to seek effective
cures and defenses. Paradoxically, in the United States'
first case of BSE, revealed by US Secretary of
Agriculture Ann M Veneman on December 23, the question
of whether the country would have a BSE "animal or
public health problem" was answered in Asia.
Within hours, the news that an elderly dead cow
in the US state of Washington was afflicted with BSE
prompted virtually all of Asia to close their markets to
all imports of US beef and beef products - from chilled
sirloin to beef jerky.
The decisions to ban by
Japan and South Korea alone, respectively the United
States' No 1 and No 2 beef markets, were enough to
deflate any notion that the US could ward off serious
damage from even one case of BSE showing up within its
borders. The reality is that Japan alone accounted for
about one-third of US beef exports. Even if the US finds
no other domestic BSE case, the economic damage already
done will be large.
Last May, just across that
border in Canada, a single BSE case wreaked havoc,
causing losses upward of US$3 billion. That was the
second case for Canada, though the first a decade ago
involved a cow imported from the United Kingdom. There
is no comfort that the state of Washington's mad cow
maybe can traced to Canadian origins and there is a good
chance that more intensive testing for BSE will turn up
more US cases.
Last autumn, Japan found its
eighth and ninth BSE-afflicted cattle after a policy of
testing all cows sent to slaughter was put in place in
2001. Testing all cattle is considered overkill by some
in the US. But it may be just become the most
cost-effective way of restoring the credibility of the
beef industry, not to mention the regulators and
industry officials who have bad-mouthed the idea.
Regardless of what the US does or does not do,
the damage is already done. There probably will be
minimal immediate benefits for other beef producers,
such as Australia, which is already Japan's largest beef
supplier. (Japan imports about 60 percent of all its
beef consumption, 49 percent of that from Australia and
45 percent from the US.) But it would be difficult for
Aussie producers to step up shipments to Japan and South
Korea.
Both Japanese and South Korea consumers
are fussy about their choice of high-quality (read, lots
of fat) cuts of beef. Much of Australia's market is for
lower-grade grass- or range-fed beef, which ends up in
places like fast-food hamburger chains. But the key word
to keep in mind is consumers.
What trade
officials see is the possibility that the addition of
the US - as the world's biggest producer - to the BSE
sick list marks a significant turning point in the
history of agricultural trade. This could lead to a
shift in the balance of power from producers to
consumers in one of the world's most valuable food
sectors. By implication, the cross-border nature of the
threat of the elusive and deadly BSE sickness may loom
larger in the minds of world-trade negotiators.
Last September, the most powerful and the least
powerful agricultural blocs failed to reach any
substantial agreement on highly protectionist and
self-serving national (or even regional) farm issues at
a crucial meeting of the World Trade Organization in
Cancun, Mexico. The WTO talks broke off with no basic
agreements on how to resolve national interests of local
farmers and global needs to balance world trade among
the rich such as the US and Japan - which heavily
subsidize farmers - and poorer countries that cannot
compete with the resulting low prices.
So the
world changed a little when US Agriculture Secretary
Veneman announced that a military aircraft was ferrying
a sample of a cow - described as a "downer" or too sick
to stand on its own - to a UK laboratory to "confirm"
the "positive" test results from its own government lab
in Ames, Iowa.
The richest farm producer in the
world found itself at the mercy of its consumers - in
the US and the rest of the world. Japan, the world's
most powerful beef importer, refused the request of a
special delegation to reconsider its decision to seal
off its borders to US beef. Neighboring South Korea
rejected the same delegation. The US became a part of
the problem.
Japan, with its domestic BSE policy
of testing all cattle for the disease, made the US
dilemma all the worse. Not only was its domestic market
painted with the color of a BSE country, its biggest
export market in the world was cut off. By all logic,
the US faces few options.
One is to join in a
yet-to-be-launched serious international effort to study
the disease. That will be expensive. But most of the
experts in the US and Japan see the other alternative,
very extensive testing of cattle herds, as the best way
in the meantime.
What followed the December 23
announcement was a striking change in US farm policy
that marked a substantial setback for the United States'
entrenched, and politically potent, domestic
beef-producer industry. The US government has chosen to
confront a number of key problems. The problem is that
Japan and other consumer countries have to sign on for
whatever the United States does for it to work and
reopen the door for US beef.
Japan's initial
reaction to its first case of BSE two and a half years
ago, in September 2001, amounted to political
expediency. Having long ignored the warnings of the BSE
threat, Japan's politicians opted to spend a large
amount of money to satisfy consumers, who still refused
for some time to return to beef eating.
Japan's
program of testing all cattle is relatively expensive,
but it is much cheaper than what the outbreak of BSE
cost the government, an estimated $5 billion in the
first six months after the initial shock. (According to
the Wall Street Journal, four companies already offer
test kits that can, within four hours, tell if a
slaughtered cow carries bovine spongiform
encephalopathy, otherwise known as BSE or mad-cow
disease. The test kits and other costs would amount to
$30-$50 per animal. Still, even some testing-firm
officials believe Japan's program is excessive, largely
because the brains of younger cattle are extremely
unlikely to contain infectious prions, the malformed
proteins that carry the disease.)
But the
Japanese government did little tackle the problem of
basic farm reforms, which continue to be thwarted the
ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Prime Minister
Junichiro Koizumi, which depends on a decades-old pact
with the farmers and the farm industry for votes at
election time. The nation's agricultural sector provides
only about 40 percent of its food on a calorie basis.
Last week, Veneman presented to her country's
trade partners promises of change, while seeking to
quell unrest among US consumers whose faith in the
safety of the food chain has been shaken by the news of
the first BSE-sick cow.
"The actions that we are
taking today are steps to enact additional safeguards to
protect the public health and maintain the confidence of
consumers, industry and our trading partners in our
already strong food safety and protection systems,"
Veneman said.
This is the key part aimed in
large part at assuaging Japanese sensitivities, without
angering US farmers any more than necessary. That means
to get Japan to consider easing its total ban on US
beef. Veneman said the United States would implement an
"aggressive" surveillance program for mad-cow disease,
under which any animal tested will not be allowed into
the food supply until test results are confirmed.
In other steps, the US will promote the
introduction of a nationwide animal-identification
system and create an international panel of scientific
experts to provide an objective review of actions taken
by the US to deal with the brain-wasting disease,
Veneman said.
"We have initiated discussions
with our trading partners, which are ongoing, to assure
them of the actions that we're taking and continue to
take to investigate this finding," Veneman said. "Our
goal is to see trade resume as quickly as possible."
Some translation is required for
non-bureaucrats. Veneman is referring to a program of
"surveillance" of the herds that was originally
strengthened in the early 1990s. That was some time
after the first BSE outbreak in the UK in 1985, which
spread to most of Europe, more recently to Japan in
September 2001 and finally North America (Canada and the
US). The US policy was to maintain inspections, often
visual, with some limited actual testing of cattle that
are considered of higher risk for BSE. This means either
showing signs (wobbly legs) of age, where cows below 30
months old are considered less of a threat.
As a
result, the US tests only about 25,000 slaughtered
cattle a year out of over 100 million cows in the herds
and over 30 million slaughtered last year.
In
Japan, testing has produced results. One is that the
Japanese consumer, in the past two years, has returned
to buying beef - both domestic beef, which is all tested
and imported beef from countries without any history of
BSE infection. (Canada was banned in May.) That left the
two major exporters, Australia and the US, accounting
for about 95 percent of all imports.
The
Japanese government will send a fact-finding team to the
US. But little progress is expected. Japan's domestic
policy of testing all cattle is the biggest problem that
the US faces in getting back into the market.
The consensus among Japanese and a number of US
scientists is that intensive testing is the best policy.
There are deep concerns that the first US BSE case along
with the two most recent Japanese cases (involving very
young cattle) indicates that the BSE disease may be
showing in different types. The current assumption is
that BSE is a strain that spread from the UK and is the
standard one.
What the US and Japan share in the
dilemma posed by BSE are domestic political
considerations. The United States faces a presidential
election, in which the safety of food will likely be a
serious issue for the current Republican administration
of President George W Bush, who has the support of the
US beef lobby. That discourages policies such as
widespread testing for BSE.
In Japan, Koizumi
has his eye on a July election of the Upper House of the
Diet (parliament). His ruling LDP needs to hold the farm
vote to prevent further inroads by an aggressive
opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).
That means he has little room to help out his ally and
friend, President Bush, on beef.
There is,
however, always some wiggle room in politics.
In
Japan, the ban on US beef is a nightmare for some food
chains and others that relied on it as a strong selling
point.
Last week, for example, perhaps the most
famous name associated with US beef for the average
consumer, Yoshinoya D&C Co, with roots back to 1899,
made top news when its owner, who swears by US beef,
announced that he would be forced to stop serving his
popular and cheap beef-and-rice bowl meals (called
gyudon) when his current one-month supply of the
US meat runs out.
That has drawn some sympathy.
US meat-industry officials would appreciate it
very much if the Japanese government would at least
allow US beef that already is physically in Japan but
has not yet cleared quarantine and customs procedures.
That amounts to about 17,000 tonnes of beef, or almost
an ordinary month's supply. There also is beef on board
ships bound for Japan. The United States can argue that
this beef has already been approved and inspected under
the beef-verification system begun on September 1 to
verify that the meat contained only US beef (with no
leakage from the banned Canadian market).
Other
major users of beef, such as some hamburger chains, are
already using mostly Australian beef, which makes up the
largest share of Japan's beef imports. (Japanese farmers
supply about 40 percent of domestic demand.) But
Australian officials say, in any case, that it would be
difficult for Aussie farmers to provide any large
infusion to the Japanese market in a hurry.
Australian beef herds are rebuilding herds after
a disastrous "100-year" drought. Stocks of both
grass-fed beef shipped frozen to Japan and chilled
grain-fed (with more fat) beef preferred by Japanese
consumers is also already committed over the near term.
It will take at least a month to get supplies flowing in
substantial amounts, according to reliable sources.
The reaction in Japan among consumers to the
prospect of no US beef has been remarkably nonchalant.
This is partly because there is no shortage of beef on
supermarket shelves and prices have remain steady, even
as the nation entered its extended New Year's holiday.
In most shops with supplies, US beef is still being sold
from stocks on hand.
And grain-fed Australian
beef is almost the same as US beef, much of it actually
produced by Japanese companies in Australia. The same is
true of Japanese meat companies in the United States,
who set up US subsidiaries to produce beef for the home
market after Japan's import market was liberalized more
than a decade ago.
All this is of little comfort
for dead mad cows, but they may be pleased that at least
the world may some day produce fewer of them.
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All
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