April 25, 2007

Hong Kong allows Japan to resume its beef exports

Japan will resume its beef exports to Hong Kong after its five-and-a-half-year ban on Japanese-grown cattle over bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), the Japanese agriculture minister said Tuesday (April 24).

Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka said quarantine authorities in Japan and Hong Kong have agreed to lift the ban which was implemented in September 2001 after its first case of BSE occurred in Japanese cattle.

Japan and Hong Kong are now in the final phase of beef import decontrol talks--which is expected to be completed this week--to eradicate the ban under two conditions.

The first is limiting Japan's exports to beef from cattle aged up to 30 months. The other is that Japanese meat processors remove brain, spinal cords and other specific risk materials which are believed to be the source of transmission of the disease.

The exports will possibly start by the end of May, ministry officials said.

Hong Kong is the third country, after the United States and Canada, to prohibit Japanese beef on the occurrence of BSE or commonly known as mad cow disease.

Hong Kong was the biggest destination for Japanese beef in 2000, when Japanese beef shipments to the territory came to 60 tonnes. Japanese grown beef was popular among affluent consumers and restaurants in Hong Kong before the disease outbreak.