April 26, 2006

USDA plans to send team to China in May on beef trade

The US Department of Agriculture is planning to send a high-level delegation to Beijing in mid-May to try to nail down the terms of how China will ease its ban on US beef, USDA officials said this week.

China agreed on Apr 11 to begin buying US beef, but that announcement--delivered by the US Commerce Department--was devoid of any details on what cuts of beef China will accept and when imports will resume.

China, along with most Asian countries, shut its borders to US beef in Dec 2003 in response to the first discovery of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy in the US.

Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi, who led a trade delegation to the US earlier this month, told reporters there would be conditions put on a resumption of beef imports.

Wu did not specify what those conditions would be, but USDA Secretary Mike Johanns said China should place no cattle-age restriction on US beef. If China agreed, that would set it apart from Hong Kong--which resumed importing US beef in December--but only so long as the beef comes from cattle under 30 months old.

Johanns, speaking to reporters on Apr 11--the day China generally agreed to start buying US beef again--said: "We have to work out exactly what we're going to be shipping (to China) and that kind of thing. The international standards are now not tied to (cattle) age."