New Japanese Beef Proposal

[farmers_son]

I meant stand with the rest of the worlds major exporting countries. Of the worlds key beef net exporters, Brazil, Australia , New Zealand and Canada, we already test the most. The EU is considered a beef exporter but like the U.S. is a net importer of beef. The U.S. remains the worlds largest importer of beef while Brazil is expected to pass Australia as the largest exporter. Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, and for that matter the South America countries do not test any significant numbers for BSE.

Brazil’s 2004 exports are forecast to be 1.4 million tonnes, Australia 1.3 million tonnes, Canada third in the world at .565 million tonnes, New Zealand a close fourth at .56 million tonnes. The U.S. is well down the list at .195 million tonnes projected exports for 2004. The EU with its extensive testing program will export only .36 million tonnes, mostly to Russia which will buy anything cheap. Certainly no EU exports to Japan.

http://www.fas.usda.gov/dlp/circular/2004/04-03LP/Beefoverview.pdf

[cakadu]

It could very well be that Australian beef gets into Japan because they haven't had a case of BSE that they know of - YET.

On the other hand, Australia has been more than willing to give the Japanese what they want in terms of product versus someone like Canada having gone in and tell them what they need to buy. Big difference which has produced results for the Australians.

If you want to bring in the trade aspect, yes, Australia does do a fair bit of trade with Japan, but an awful lot of Australians go to Singapore to buy goods as well.

[jensend]

i guess since the eu is a net importer the japanese market is of no interest to them since it wants high end cuts and the russians will take what the europeans don't want. that would be the more likely reason for no european exports to japan than any particular distrust of the european product. seems to me the japanese (and others) market would be of vital interest to us. the usa doesn't want us out of step with them because if we do move on our own it will probably give us an advantage. this 'sound science' absurdity is getting more ludicrous every day. if so much is known why haven't the projected numbers of vcjd materialized? the japanese may be the intelligent ones for demanding testing when there is not enough known about this disease or condition. we are allowing ourselves to be held back. i also believe we are suffering unnecessary expense by losing byproduct value which would recover at least part of the cost of testing. the large packers don't want their production methods disturbed and that is the biggest impetus behind the dispute between n. america and japan.