January 9, 2006

 

US group petitions against Canadian cattle imports

 

 

The cattle rancher group R-CALF United Stock growers of America filed a petition Friday to ask the US District Court in Montana to hear its request for an injunction to stop the US from allowing imports of Canadian cattle.

 

The US District Court in Montana granted R-CALF a preliminary injunction in March last year to prevent the USDA from lifting its ban on Canadian cattle. The USDA successfully appealed that decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals which reversed the preliminary injunction on July 14.

 

The USDA immediately eased the ban it had placed on Canadian cattle more than two years earlier after the appeals court decision to scrap the preliminary injunction.

 

The USDA lifted its ban only on Canadian cattle under 30 months of age in July and is now working on a new federal rule that would allow older cattle into the US.

 

It was in May 2003 that the USDA blocked shipments of all Canadian cattle in reaction to the country's revelation that it discovered the first native-born North American case of mad-cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

 

Since then, Canada has reported finding two additional BSE cases and the first infected cow found in the US was subsequently confirmed to have been imported from Canada.

 

In the motion filed by R-Calf Friday to the US District Court in Montana, the group requested a hearing "at the Court's earliest convenience."

 

R-CALF complained in a separate filing also submitted Friday that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals relied solely on the "expertise" of USDA in regards to the safety of importing Canadian cattle.

 

"The conclusion (is) that USDA's regulation of BSE has been guided by consideration of inappropriate factors rather than sound scientific judgment," the cattle group said in the document.

 

R-CALF also claimed in its filing that new scientific evidence in the study of BSE supports its initial claim that cattle from Canada, and even beef from Japan, should be barred from entering the US. The filing says the USDA completely reversed itself on the required BSE-mitigation measures in its final rule allowing Japanese beef to enter the US, making both rules "arbitrary and capricious".

 

Private attorney Tom Bird of Bird & Sturgeon in New Albany, Ind., gave the effort little chance of success unless R-CALF USA has "very compelling, additional information" that was not part of the original case and appeal. He stressed the word "additional," saying courts would not reverse previous decisions by a higher court unless there is a compelling reason to do so.

 

"The court would not listen to the same evidence twice," Bird said.

 

The US imported 1.7 million head of live cattle from Canada in 2002, the year before the cattle were banned, according to USDA statistics. USDA Chief Economist Keith Collins predicted in a recent interview that the US would import about one million head of Canadian cattle in 2006, thanks to the easing of the US ban on younger animals.