R-Calf to Give More Evidence to International Trade Commission

US - US cattle ranchers' action group R-Calf USA has been called on by the International Trade Commission to give further evidence of BSE and country of origin labelling.
calendar icon 29 November 2007
clock icon 3 minute read

The appeal for more evidence from R-Calf follows their recent testimony to the ITC hearing on "Global Beef Trade: Effects of Animal Healthy, Sanitary, Food Safety and Other Measures on U.S. Beef Exports,"

R-Calf has now been called to give additional information on the proper approach to mitigating the risk of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) posed by imports; the role of BSE testing technologies, country-of-origin labeling (COOL) and animal identification in addressing BSE concerns; and, the impacts of lost export markets on the domestic cattle industry.

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"The relevant question today is whether the U.S. is justified in abandoning its longstanding protection strategy in favor of a more relaxed policy."

R-CALF USA Trade Committee Chair Eric Nelson.

“We appreciate this opportunity to present this additional information to the ITC,” said R-CALF USA Trade Committee Chair Eric Nelson, who testified at the hearing. “We believe it’s important that the ITC investigate the health, sanitary and food safety measures imposed not only by other countries, but also by the U.S. that have caused U.S. cattle producers to lose significant market share around the world.”

With regard to questions about the approaches the U.S. and other countries have taken to regulate imports in response to the risks posed by BSE, one Commissioner asked why representatives of the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association (CCA), the American Meat Institute (AMI) and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) believe that the response to Canada’s BSE outbreak was an “overreaction.”

“R-CALF does not agree the U.S. overreacted by restricting imports of beef and cattle from Canada in May 2003 following Canada’s announcement that it had detected an indigenous case of BSE,” Nelson pointed out. “The current relaxed U.S. policy is an abandonment of the longstanding BSE protection strategy originally employed by our government to prevent the introduction of this disease.

“The relevant question for policy makers today is not whether the U.S. ‘overreacted’ by implementing a longstanding and effective policy to protect the U.S. from the introduction of BSE from Canada,” he asserted. “Instead, the relevant question today is whether the U.S. is justified in abandoning its longstanding protection strategy in favor of a more relaxed policy, and what effect this will have on exports of U.S. beef and cattle.

While the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) insists the BSE risk profiles of the U.S. and Canada are essentially the same, Nelson pointed out that “our export customers know that research by the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) shows that Canadian cattle are 26 times more likely to test positive for BSE than U.S. cattle, and that here in the U.S., we have not detected any BSE-infected cattle with the same strain of the disease that was responsible for the BSE outbreaks in Europe and Canada.”

Additionally, USDA acknowledges that between 19 to 105 BSE-infected cattle could come into the U.S. from Canada and potentially infect up to 75 head of cattle here, and the agency claims that kind of risk is acceptable, Nelson said.

“Our export customers also know that the U.S. feed ban is considered to be inadequate to prevent the spread of BSE through cross-contamination – a leading cause of BSE amplification in Canada – and as a result, the U.S. continues to experience minimal success in its efforts to restore those lost export markets,” he pointed out. “The U.S. was not justified in relaxing its BSE protections with respect to Canada, a fact that has been resoundingly reflected by world market reactions.”

With regard to questions concerning testing for BSE, technology does exist that would permit meatpackers and others to test cattle for BSE, but currently, less than one percent of the cattle slaughtered in the U.S. and Canada are tested for the disease, and USDA policy opposes meatpackers’ efforts to voluntarily test their own products.

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