Ag Minister on the move - Horay

[kato]

Roseanne Wowchuk, our minister in Manitoba is now saying that testing cows born before the feed ban would be a good idea. It's easy to say when you let all the packers leave the province years ago, but at least she said it.

The more noise we make about testing all animals the better. You'd better believe that the Americans don't want to see it. Japan has already said it would take our beef if it was tested. I bet we could get it up and running pretty quick up here, especially for cows and prospective export animals.

Even in Japan, where the consumers are supposed to be so fussy, does their beef consumption drop when they find a positive now? I'm not sure it does any more. Maybe someone could answer that one for me?

Test them, get it over with. Anything has got to be better than the last 8 months.

As for the COOL, maybe now the American public will find out where the good steaks are really coming from. I don't care what anyone says, a 13 month old barley fed steer will beat a 2 year old corn fed longhorn cross any day.

[cowman]

I believe once the Japanese government went to the full test the consumer came back on line and are very satisfied with the safety of the Japanese product. After all they are assured that they are getting BSE free meat. Now if the USA buffaloes the Japs into taking their untested meat, that could rapidly change!
Perhaps Bob Speller will get a better understanding of what the Japanese and Koreans need in the way of food safety. I suspect he knows what has to be done...he sort of left the testing question open when he said "We don't feel we need to test every animal...AT THIS TIME" I guess you could call that a veiled threat to the Americans, or maybe just a good politician setting up the public for the real deal! He also announced funding for a new string of labs....
I would imagine the pollsters are hard at work this week finding out how the public is percieving this. Martin has an election coming up and he doesn't need to be seen as not up to par on food safety!
Perhaps our redemption is at hand?

[rsomer]

Bob Speller announced that Canada will be testing 8000 head for BSE in 2004. This would be consistent with a similar small increase in testing in the United States. No matter what Ralph Kline says or what the Japanese are demanding or what the couple from the farm at Calmar who raised the Washington Holstein say needs to be done, the Canadian response to BSE will be harmonized with the U.S. response. If you want to know what Canada is going to do in regards to the BSE crisis, look south of the border. I’m not saying that is what should be done, but it is the reality that we are dealing with.
I haven’t figured out how COOL will figure in with this harmonized approach to a "North American" beef industry.

[kato]

Offering to go to the next level on our own is exactly what the Americans don't want to hear. It's call leverage. The United States has made leverage an art form, and it's about time we took it up ourselves.

We can't keep up like this much longer, so we'd better do something.

[StrawBoss]

Bob Speller is wasting time and money by just traveling the world and telling people Canadian beef is safe. His line should be “ will you buy our beef if we test all our cattle for a minimum of three years to prove we are BSE free”? --- anything less and he may as well go on a pleasure trip and catch some contaminated west coast farm salmon, and see if he can sell it the local bars.

[cowman]

Well Bob Speller is going to Asia to ask them just what it will take. You don't cut those kind of deals over the phone. Or in the papers!
Who knows what will happen? I suspect the Americans will be nervous about what he might be talking about with the Japanese? I mean he could be telling them we are going to test?
I am pretty sure the Americans would be quite happy if he just stayed home and let the USA decide our fate...you know sort of how VanClief did?