January 12, 2004

Philippines Set Rules For US Beef Imports

The Philippine Department of Agriculture is taking steps to prevent the entry of beef imports from the U.S. that may have been infected with mad cow disease, according to Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo.

The agriculture department released Monday a set of guidelines on U.S. beef imports, signed by Lorenzo.

According to the guidelines, "only deboned and deglanded beef from cattle not older than 30 months, devoid of any nerves and other BSE specified risk materials shall be imported."

The guidelines come after an announcement from the USDA Dec. 23 on the discovery of a case of mad cow disease, also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, on a farm in Washington state.

The guidelines also state that imports should be certified by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as having been slaughtered not earlier than 30 months previously.

According to Lorenzo, the guidelines are necessary as the Philippines imports beef and beef products from the U.S. The volume of imports wasn't immediately available.

Since the discovery of the BSE case in the U.S., several countries including Japan, South Korea, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, have imposed import bans on U.S. beef.

BSE is a fatal degenerative disease of the central nervous system of cattle, and is believed to arise from cattle being fed infected meat and bone meal.

Human consumption of BSE-infected beef is thought to cause the fatal human variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.