USDA Rules Against Private BSE Testing.

[rsomer]

USDA has rejected a meatpacker's plan to test every animal at its Kansas slaughterhouse for mad cow disease in order to meet Japan's demand for testing of all cattle it buys. The department's ruling Thursday removes at least one question mark relative to the potential to resume beef exports to Japan. Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, was seeking to privately test each animal at its Arkansas City, Kansas, plant.

[kato]

Anybody know what the Canadian government's opinion on private testing is?

[Horse]

I feel it makes perfect sence because if they test every animal you just know there will be more turn up and then the rollercoaster starts all over again better the public dont get those news casts to regular.

[grassfarmer]

Horse, One thing I can tell you from experience is that if you attempt to cover up BSE or mislead consumers over it's prevelance the beef industry would be committing suicide.

[Willowcreek]

USDA and NCBA keep telling us down here in the states that there is no chance of anymore cases of BSE being found in the US. Then they should not be afraid of testing- unless???
The major packers control USDA and the NCBA and they don't want the competition Creekstone would make.
Why else would you stand in the way of free enterprise that could raise the demand of beef and hopefully raise the price? Japan wants Creekstones tested beef- Japan will pay the costs of testing. Win-Win situation for American and Canadian producers.
And if their is a worst problem with BSE than we think- better to find it now and start mandatory testing than 5 years from now when people start appearing with vCJD.
A year or two of no positives would revive the market and testing could be ended.

[cowman]

Right from the start both of our governments and cattle organizations fought the whole idea of testing, while most of the producers were generally for it? After all it made sense to pay the thirty dollar test to get $700 for your old cow rather than $100 with no test?
Now why would the government/organizations be so against it? Well it's simple...follow the money! Who made a killing on BSE? The packers/retailers! Why on earth would they want to have a solution that took $600 more dollars out of their pockets?
The other reason to not test is I believe both the US and Canada are following a solution of "Shoot, Shovel, and Shutup"! If you don't go looking you sure won't find anything! I guess they all took note of what Ralph was saying when he spouted off about the 3S solution, while ripping him in public! Then they quietly went out and implemented the 3S solution? After all what was the first thing the USDA did?...NO MORE DOWNERS!

[amazed]

When I read that the Japanese will pay for the BSE testing I have to wonder why they would increase the tarrif from 38.5% to 50% on US beef last August if they wanted it so badly that they will now pay for the testing.

[rsomer]

I think Japan doesn’t have any right to ask for 100% BSE testing.

Lets consider what is really going on here. Japan is trying to write the trade rules on imported beef. "The customer is always right" is not the issue here. The market does not know if the Japanese customer will accept American beef without test or for that matter Canadian beef without test because the Japanese government is not allowing their consumers that choice. North American beef is being denied access to Japan for political reasons. Food safety certainly is not the issue if we are considering North American beef under 30 months of age.

Japan cannot, on its own, write new quality guidelines for imported beef. Who do they think they are, Americans? At the same time as Japan is denying access to American beef they are sending their exported products to the U.S. International trade is a two way street, if they want to send Japanese cars to the U.S. they have to take U.S. beef in return.

I think the Japanese have an identity crisis going on here, they think they can act like Americans. This coming week U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney will visit Japan and remind them just who is master and who is slave. As slave they don’t get to write the rules and they don’t get to ask for 100% testing. They don’t have that right. Canadians are smarter than the Japanese and have known this fact for a long time. They didn’t need to have an atomic bomb dropped on them to be reminded.

I couldn’t help but notice the U.S. request to send this issue to the WTO and WHO, why didn’t Canada think of that?

[rsomer]

I would tend to agree 100% with cowman on this one. Test all the slaughter animals over thirty months, and under, if that is what it takes. We will be the ones to ultimately pay for it, why shouldn't we be the ones to decide.

[amazed]

But rpkaiser IS that what it takes?

I tend to agree with rsomer and believe it is nothing but politics. There is no guarantee the Japanese will take any beef even if it is tested and they want ALL our beef tested.