The Dec,29, 04 announcement that the USDA would open our borders up to Canadian beef would cause US cattle farmers to lose billion of dollars and the USDA even said it was acceptable to the World Organization for Animal Health for Canada to have 11 cases of BSE (Mad Cow Disease). Since when do we, "THE USA", get our economic or health and welfare polices from the World Organization for Animal Health? The only sane thing to do is extend the ban 30 months from the date of every positive BSE test. We lost 5% of our demand when Japan banned US beef back in Dec. 03 and now with Japan agreed to start back purchasing US beef we are jeopardizing this agreement by sending a message to the World, we will allow our Beef Supply to be Compromised. The USA has a Certified BSE FREE Heard so why should we compromise our position like this even if there was a risk of only One Positive BSE case. Please understand quarantine and eradication will protect us economically and healthwise.
Ron DeHaven,head of USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, made some interesting statements today concerning the health risks.
"USDA remains confident that the animal and public health measures that Canada has in place ... combined with existing U.S. domestic safeguards and the additional safeguards announced" on Dec. 29 as part of re-opening the border to Canadian cattle "provide the utmost protections to U.S. consumers and livestock," Ron DeHaven, head of USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, said in a statement.
One U.S. senator, Democrat Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, called on USDA to pull back its move toward expanded trade with Canada.
"In light of the fact there has now been another confirmed case of BSE in Canada, it is clear the responsibility of the USDA should be to immediately suspend efforts to open that border," Dorgan wrote in a letter to Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman.
DeHaven said USDA took into account the possibility of additional Canadian cases when it wrote the rule on resuming cattle trade.
Under guidelines of the World Organization for Animal Health, a country can be classed as presenting minimal risk of mad cow disease if it has less than two cases per million head of cattle over 24 months of age in each of the previous four years.
Since Canada has roughly 5.5 million cattle in that age group, "they could detect up to 11 cases of (mad cow disease) in this population and still be considered a minimal risk country, as long as their risk mitigation measures and other preventive measures were effective," DeHaven said.
Even Democrat Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, got this one correct.
Please work to extend the USDA's Ban on Canadian Cattle until such time Canada has had a 30 month period of BSE Free testing
Mark, seems like you would like it both ways. Continue to punish Canada for the single BSE case and at the same time stop the punishment by Japan on US exports for a single BSE case.
Also consider the following:
Both the beef industry and the USDA acknowledge that eventually another mad cow case is likely to be discovered among the 40 million adult cattle in the United States. About 1 percent of the herd, or 446,000 cattle, are considered in the targeted "high risk" category, according to the USDA, because they are not ambulatory and do not show signs of other ailments.
The USDA ruling, effective March 7, declared Canada a "minimal-risk region" so that cattle could be shipped into the United States under certain restrictions. The cattle must be slaughtered by the age of 30 months, which scientists say is too young to contract mad cow disease, and they must be transported in sealed containers to a feedlot or slaughter house.
Canada punished themselves.
This is not health issue it is an economic issue. If we allow the border to open livestock producers and feedlots will lose $100-200 an animal. The packers win, because they will not lower their exit prices and the livestock owner gets kicked in the butt. BSE has been propagated in the dairy industry in Canada because they need to intensively feed dairy cattle to produce.
We do not kill downers now in the USA so it will be unlikely we will have any beef cattle testing positive. Opening the border destroys the public and world confidence in a our Beef Heard being BSE FREE.
This whole thing smells of someone getting some money under the table.
I completely agree with you Mark. While I think the world of the canadians on the board here this is going to severely impact the cattle industry here in the states. There is a massive letter writing and congressman calling agenda to halt this.
First of all Canada is NOT BSE free now. Canada also does not have nearly the restrictions and regulatory controls that the US does. The case of mad cow disease in the US CAME from Canada. I understand the cattle market in Canada is suffering but it does no good to subject the US to the same fate.
It seems it's politics at it's worst.. catering to & bending the rules for big businesses to make a profit. For cattle.. it's open the borders.. for pharmacy drugs.. it's illegal to import/export.. (same drugs.. but somehow the drugs would be unsafe for the U.S.).. we can't have the U.S. paying less for medicine.. it'll cut the profits for the big drug companies.
I feel sorry for the Canadian Beef farm families.. like being a farmer wasn't hard enough.
I completely agree that I feel sorry for the Canadian ranchers. I wonder though if the situation was reversed if Canada would even think about opening their borders.
I don't think it's a matter of "if," Doc, I think it's a matter of when. Looking at Al Wa's number of 446,000 cattle targeted in the "high risk" catagory, something's got to give. After all, we imposed the animal byproduct feed ban in 1997, as did the US, and while R-CALF is claiming that there are still problems with Canadian feed, they fail to point out that, according to an MSNBC News report on April 27,2004, "Just under 100 U.S. companies have recently violated regulations meant to prevent the spread of mad cow disease, according to new records from the Food and Drug Administration."
Mark Dopp, the American Meat Institute's senior vice president for regulatory affairs and general counsel made some interesting statements at the end of the year. While he was addressing the issue of a partial ban of Canadian cattle (anything over 30 months can't go over the border) I think he makes some interesting points.
Dopp noted that some cattle producers in the Northern Tier states support maintaining a ban on all beef and cattle trade with Canada. "Those who hold this view are taking a narrow-minded, short-term approach to what will become a long-term problem if fundamental economic restructuring continues in the Canadian packing industry," Dopp said. "Instead of behaving like the Hatfields and McCoys, which seems to be what some groups prefer, we need to behave like the integrated North American meat industry that we have become."
Dopp also called "utterly irresponsible and unscientific" attempts to justify this partial ban with claims that Canadian beef and cattle are somehow "less safe" than U.S. beef and cattle. "We've said it before and we'll say it again. Calling Canadian beef unsafe is like calling your twin sister ugly," Dopp said. "The U.S. and Canada both have implemented state-of-the-art, meat inspection and animal disease prevention systems. As we look across the borders, we see near mirror images of one another."
I disagree with you Dave because the ONLY way to maintain the BSE free status is to NOT allow in beef from other countries that have BSE cases. It's all about public perception. Tonight on the evening news there was a whole story on how safe your meat is. They did a story on how we are going to allow canadian beef back into the US and now there is another case of BSE in Canada. It's not just about the #'s but about public perception as well.
I know Canadians have protested against the mad cow disease and that has hurt beef consumption in your country. It's also a fact that Canada's beef consumption is significantly less per capita than the US. It's also a fact that on all sides of this there is unscientific information going on. At this point however with a brand new case of mad cow disease being found it is only going to further damage beef prices and production in the long run.
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