OIE Sets New Standards for BSE Risk

[farmers_son]

May 26, 2005
Reuters
David Evans
PARIS - The world animal health organisation OIE, has, according to this story, set new guidelines on beef exports and the risk of mad cow disease on Thursday, adopting a new country code and making deboned red meat freely traded under certain conditions.
OIE Director General Bernard Vallat was cited as telling a press conference that it wanted to simplify the way countries are judged to be at risk from the deadly cattle disease, also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), and devised a new three-tier system to replace the current five risk categories, adding, "There will now be three categories. A classification will depend on the risk in each country."
The story explains that OIE guidelines, which come into immediate effect, are non-binding on its 167 members, but are often used by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for settling cross border trading disputes involving animal health issues.
The OIE added the new categories would put more emphasis on the relative safety of beef exports rather than purely the number of mad cow cases a country had registered.
Alex Thiermann, president of the OIE's International Animal Health Code, was quoted as saying, "The important thing for us is to focus on risk, not whether a country has had one or 10 cases."
Vallat was further cited as explaining the three country categories would be known as "negligible risk", "controlled risk" and "undetermined risk."
The first category is for countries with no BSE history and the second for those that have had or may have had cases. Both require risk assessments and strict surveillance. Extra controls would be imposed on second category countries.
All other countries, with no risk or surveillance measures, would be in a third category with limited trading possibilities.

[melvill]

How will that help our situation ? If the recommendations are non binding, they can be either accepted or ignored. My bet is that RCalf will be lobbying like mad to have them ignored in the US.

[farmers_son]

If nothing else, this should go a long way to see that our boneless boxed beef trade with the U.S. is not stopped. The risk of that happening was small before but it is less now. I take this as a positive step that will help Canada in its trade with the U.S. and other international markets.

http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/!ut/p/_s.7_0_A/7_0_1OB?contentidonly=true&contentid=2005/05/0189.xml

Statement By Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns Regarding The OIE'S Adoption Of Changes To The International Animal Health Code Chapter On BSE

May 26, 2005

"I applaud the leadership of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) in modernizing the international approach to the safe trade of beef products by updating the BSE guidelines to reflect current science.

"The United States and several other countries have advocated for guidelines that reflect science, the low risk associated with BSE, and the effectiveness of risk mitigation measures. I applaud the OIE for developing guidelines that incorporate all such factors. The international standard for to BSE is now based on the same information that has guided the United States' current practices and the proposed minimal risk rule.

"Among other items, the OIE has now officially recognized additions to the list of non-risk products-most significantly to include boneless beef that can be traded without regard to a country's BSE status.

"The OIE has also adopted a new, streamlined system for classifying countries according to relative risk for BSE in a manner that reflects the steps they have implemented to manage and reduce that risk.

"We look forward to working with other countries to amend regulations to reflect these guidelines, which will continue to promote our first objective of safeguarding animal and human health."

[farmers_son]

farmers_son, lets hope that this is a plus for the industry. It would be nice to have something positive happen after two years of negatives for the industry.

[farmers_son]

We will get there, the only question is when.

[grassfarmer]

I assume that he is applauding it because it will allow US beef exports to resume under the new rules rather than allow Canadian beef to flow freely into the US once again.
Still it is a move in the right direction hopefully we might benefit at some point down the line.