After finding the 14th new case, Japan to ease BSE rules

[Taro Toporific]

Japan looks to ease mad cow rules
CNN - Oct 15
TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) -- The Japanese government said Friday it would ask its food safety agency to approve an easing of rules requiring tests on all cattle ... Japan on Thursday confirmed its 14th case of mad cow disease after a 4-year-old cow on the northern island of Hokkaido tested positive for theillness. (Full story)....

[Bongo]

Yeah the LDP figures people with spongier brains will not complain when they raise the retirement to age to 101 years of age, cut the pension to 10% and, that they may continue to vote for the LDP.

[emperor]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57245-2004Oct23.html

[Andocrates]

This post runs every few days like clockwork and it has for the last year. It isn't going to happen.

[deltaco]

that is the question.

[CLOWNPUNCHER]

It ain't gonna happen..American beef. British beef, it's all infected.

The Japanese market now belongs to Australia and New Zealand by far the two nations with the safest and best beef.

American beef ...bwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I wouldn't even feed it to my dog !!

[devicenull]

It ain't gonna happen..American beef. British beef, it's all infected.

The Japanese market now belongs to Australia and New Zealand by far the two nations with the safest and best beef.

American beef ...bwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I wouldn't even feed it to my dog !!

cornfed beef is the best... period. i want to be able to buy ground beef that is actually good and 100% beef. i am sick of this pork/beef mix shit. and the rare occassion that i DO find 100% it is ungodly expensive and tastes like shit due to it being grassfed.

[dimwit]

American beef ...bwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I wouldn't even feed it to my dog !!

Well Yoshinoya does buy a hell of a lot of it and has been really suffering as a result of the import restrictions. Apparently NZ and Aussie beef doesn't really cut it in the restaurant business, hence the large scale lobbying to resume imports.

[CLOWNPUNCHER]

American beef ...bwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I wouldn't even feed it to my dog !!

Well Yoshinoya does buy a hell of a lot of it and has been really suffering as a result of the import restrictions. Apparently NZ and Aussie beef doesn't really cut it in the restaurant business, hence the large scale lobbying to resume imports.

Large scale lobbying by the Americans.

Can't see any of that on the Japanese side.Even before all this went down most beef sold in supermarkets was Australian anyway .

Yoshhinoya is hardly a giant in the beef consumption industry.

[Skankster]

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actually I think most of you all know but I will say again because some of the ignorant seem to know it.

Japan beef is all grain fed
US beef, is mostly grain fed

so Japan likes grain fed beef.
it is better tasting, softer and more nutritious.

Austrailian beef is mostly grass fed (feeding of the plains)
NZ beef is mostly grass fed
Argentinian beef is all grass fed
Brazilian and Mexican beef is also grass fed.

Point is if the Japanese wanted grass fed beef they would buy it from Argentinia. Because its quality that matters.

[CLOWNPUNCHER]

-
-
actually I think most of you all know but I will say again because some of the ignorant seem to know it.

Japan beef is all grain fed
US beef, is mostly grain fed

so Japan likes grain fed beef.
it is better tasting, softer and more nutritious.

Austrailian beef is mostly grass fed (feeding of the plains)
NZ beef is mostly grass fed
Argentinian beef is all grass fed
Brazilian and Mexican beef is also grass fed.

Point is if the Japanese wanted grass fed beef they would buy it from Argentinia. Because its quality that matters.

Australian beef and New Zealand beef is ALL grass fed.

Japanese like Japanese beef for that reason alone IT'S JAPANESE same as the rice.

My point being most Japanese couldn't give a rats ass about American beef.It's the Americans who are making a big deal about wanting to sell a tainted product to Japan.

Come to think about it, What does America make that Joe Average wants to buy.

Lets see I have a couple of T shirts that say made in the USA and the intel chip in my PC is made by an American company.

Besides that not much !!

[bejiita]

Come to think about it, What does America make that Joe Average wants to buy.

It's the PORN baby! :P Oh, and all that content stuff that comes out of Hollywood and Multimedia Gulch.

[Mulboyne]

Kyodo via Yahoo: Yoshinoya opens 1st "gyudon" outlet in Australia
Slow link...

[Mulboyne]

USDA FAQ on Resumption of beef trade

1. When will actual shipments likely begin?
It is not possible to say exactly...all things taken together suggest that several weeks will be required for the resumption of sales.
...2. What proportion of previous sales will this Agreement permit?
This Agreement permits sales of beef and products from animals 20 months old or younger. The U.S. beef production system is geared to producing younger animals. Estimates suggest that about 70% of the 35 million cattle slaughtered each year are steers and heifers 20 months or younger
...4. How long will this Agreement be in place? What is the longer-term outlook for U.S.-Japan beef trade?
[T]his Agreement marks a start in the resumption of trade. July 2005 marks an important review. And, the longer-term view would be a return to normalcy in our trading relationship.
5. The Agreement includes resumption of Japan's beef sales to the United States market. What does this entail?
Japan has requested to resume its sales to our market. And, without prejudging the results of any evaluation, we have indicated that we will commence our rulemaking process.

[Mulboyne]

Bloomberg: Japan Says Mad Cow Test Results Due This Week
Japan is examining a possible new case of mad cow disease that may delay an agreed resumption of some U.S. beef imports to Japan. Test results are due by week's end. Local government officials are conducting follow-up tests on the 20-month-old steer from the northern island Hokkaido after an initial test on Nov. 29 detected the disease bovine spongiform encephalopathy, local dairy official Osamu Terada said today.
If confirmed, it would be the youngest mad cow in Japan and threaten an October accord resuming U.S. beef imports of cattle 20 months of age or younger. Japan, which banned all U.S. beef last year after a case of mad cow was found in Washington state, agreed to allow some imports because testing was thought incapable of detecting the sickness in younger animals.

[Mulboyne]

Kyodo Via Japan Today: Japan's 1st case of human mad cow disease confirmed
The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said Friday it has confirmed Japan's first case of the human variant of mad cow disease. The patient, who is already dead, was in Britain for about a month around 1990, the ministry said. About 150 people have died due to the disease in Britain.

[Mulboyne]

Upi via Newkerala.com: Japan takes measures against fatal disease
Japan's Health Ministry said Tuesday that it will not allow citizens who have lived in Britain for more than a month since 1980 to donate blood or organs. The ban takes effect immediately. The decision follows the announcement last week of the death of Japan's first victim of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. The man apparently had lived in Britain for about a month in 1989.

[Mulboyne]

news.co.au: Japan admits 15th mad cow case
JAPAN confirmed Saturday its 15th case of mad cow disease since 2001, saying a Holstein born in the northern main island of Hokkaido had tested positive for the brain-wasting disease.

[FG Lurker]

[Taro Toporific]

Japan confirms 21st case of mad cow diseaseSun Dec 11, 2005 1:58 AM ET7
TOKYO (Reuters) -Japan has confirmed its 21st case of mad cow disease in a 69-month-old Holstein cow on the northernmost main island of Hokkaido, the Farm Ministry said.
The meat and intestines from the slaughtered cow will be destroyed and will not enter the food supply, the ministry said in a statement dated December 10....more...

[emperor]

..Japan likes grain fed beef.
it is better tasting, softer and more nutritious...

Beef from grass-fed cattle has a "healthier" profile of fatty acids than beef from grain-fed cattle.

http://www.eatwild.com/basics.html

[Buraku]

Go home !
go home beef of the gaijin-Yanks

Japan will halt U.S. beef imports following the discovery of material considered at risk of mad cow disease in a shipment from the United States, Kyodo News agency reported

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's office said Agriculture Minister Shoichi Nakagawa has recommended a total halt to U.S. beef imports. Nakagawa said earlier Friday it was possible that material from cattle backbones was included in beef recently imported from the United States, according to Yumiko Sakurai, a ministry official.

[AssKissinger]

45 Japan Cows Suspected of Having Mad Cow Thu Feb 9, 3:31 AM ET



Forty-five cows at a farm in northern Japan are suspected of having mad cow disease and will be destroyed, officials said Thursday.

The cows are from a farm on the northern island of Hokkaido where a cow died last month of the disease — Japan's 22nd mad cow case. Following the death, the Hokkaido government banned the farm from moving any of its more than 400 cows, said Osamu Terada, an official with Hokkaido prefecture.

The dead cow was not raised for food and posed no danger to the country's beef supply, officials said.

The cows to be destroyed include 43 adults and two calves — the offspring of the cow that died in January, the Hokkaido prefecture said in a statement.

The announcement came a month after Japan halted all imports of U.S. beef following the discovery of backbones in a shipment of American veal. The bones are deemed to be at risk of mad cow disease and are banned under a deal that reopened the Japanese market to U.S. beef in December.

The recent import halt was a harsh turnaround for the U.S. beef business in Japan. Tokyo banned American beef in December 2003 after the first U.S. case of mad cow disease, and lifted the embargo only in December of last year.

Hokkaido official Hiroyuki Takeuchi said authorities are treating the 45 cows as suspected disease carriers under Japanese government guidelines on handling infected cattle. The guidelines call for any cattle given the same feed and raised in the same pen for the first year of life with a cow that tests positive to be destroyed as an infected animal, he said.

Calves born within two years of the discovery of mad cow among their herd are also treated as suspected infection cases, he said.

Prefectural officials will test the cattle Friday after they are destroyed to determine if they indeed had the disease, local official Shizuo Matsuoka said. Results could be available as early as Monday.

The dead Hokkaido cow was fed with meat-and-bone meal — the first known use of such feed in Japan since it was banned in 2001, Terada said. The case also marks the first time the feed's use has been linked to a mad cow-infected animal in Japan, he said.

Officials are investigating how the meal came to be used for the cow, which died on Jan. 20, he said.

After confirming its first case of mad cow disease in 2001, Japan began testing every domestically slaughtered cow entering the market and banned the use of meat-and-bone meal made from ruminant animal parts because of the possibility they could transmit the disease.

Mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, is a brain-wasting disease in cattle, which in humans can cause a variant form, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. The disease has killed more than 150 people, mostly in Britain, where there was an outbreak in the 1990s.

[Big Booger]