Sandhusker
Well-known member
Age-old question
How safe are older Canadian animals? The U.S. beef industry may well soon find out as Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns reissues a rule to allow them into U.S. commerce.
By John Gregerson, editor
There's just one little problem with a voluminous USDA document seeking to ease restrictions on imports of Canadian cattle into the United States, as well as a corresponding proposal, issued in January, essentially seeking the same.
Both documents conclude that by the time dawn broke on March 2, 1999, Canada had swept the last of its ruminant feed out of its silos and storage sheds, its troughs and its truck beds. Any animal born after March 1, the documents hold, is unlikely to have consumed any prion-infected feed, and therefore eligible to mosey into U.S. commerce. Fine, but for the fact that three of the last four Canadian animals diagnosed with bovine spongiform encephalopathy were born from one to four years after those silos and sheds ostensibly were cleared of potentially infective feed.
Residue is one explanation that's been proffered, and indeed, it is an apt metaphor for a problem that refuses to go away, no matter how many government documents suggest otherwise. To be sure, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns has left a prodigious paper trail, first with a rule designating Canada a minimum risk region for BSE, at least by the reckoning of OIE standards, then with a series of studies indicating that all's clear on the Canadian front. Problem is, virtually every time USDA prepares to reopen U.S. markets to older Canadian animals, an older Canadian animal is diagnosed with BSE.
Four years and counting
The most troubling case was uncovered late last July, a 4-year-old animal from the province of Alberta. Two weeks later, in mid-August, it was back to the drawing board for Johanns, who had no choice but to pull the plug on a proposed rule that would have opened U.S. borders to Canadian cattle older than 30 months. No sooner did the rule resurface in January than an Alberta bull was diagnosed with BSE. Its approximate age: 6 years, meaning the animal likely was born in 2001, well past the March 1999 date, to say nothing of August 1997, when Canada first implemented its ruminant-to-ruminant feed ban.
Under the USDA rule, the animal's age would have made it eligible for export, just as the 4-year-old animal would have been. The difference is, this time USDA isn't backpedaling. Word on the bull is that it is "consistent in both age and location with other cases found in Canada."
By that, USDA means consistent "with certain [disease] clusters [located] around certain feed sources," says Jim Hodges, president of the American Meat Institute Foundation. The short version, he explains, is that at one time a BSE-infected Canadian animal apparently passed into Alberta's rendering or feed distribution chains, thus enabling BSE to ripple - or "amplify" - through the Alberta herd over a period of time.
The question is, how many herd members, and how much time? Hodges, among others, doesn't care to speculate, though it is the million-dollar question insofar as USDA's rule goes.
Fact is, there is far more at stake than a million here or a million there, with most of it poised to circulate in Asian markets far away from American prairies. Hodges is uneasy quantifying the direct economic impact the rule would have on U.S. processing operations, but suggests those older Canadian animals wouldn't make or break many domestic businesses save for a handful of slaughterhouses scattered across western northern-tier states.
At least four U.S. senators don't agree, having written to Johanns in early February that "increasing U.S. imports of Canadian cattle and beef would have a significant negative impact on the economic well-being of American cattle producers." Predictably, the four senators, who include Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), hail from R-CALF country, home of the independent producer, who detractors allege barters in science in order to advance his so-called protectionist agenda.
Which is why it is surprising to see the four senators play the economic card - even if their argument is somewhat dubious - owing to the fact that it relies upon a different animal, meaning price drops associated with U.S. imports of younger Canadian animals.
Nevertheless, the letter covers its bases, on the one hand acknowledging the bigger prize lies in Asia, and on the other warning that any muddying of trade waters with older Canadian animals will make "regaining our lost export markets even more difficult," especially in the event the rule leads to "the importation of additional BSE-infected animals from Canada."
For the United States, the issue also may mark the difference between a "negligible risk" status for BSE under OIE standards or merely "controlled risk," the designation it currently shares with Canada. Negligible risk status requires that the youngest animal with BSE be born more than 11 years ago, a claim Canada can't make, but the United States arguably can. So, when they aren't asking their congressmen to deep-six the Canadian rule, R-CALF members are urging lawmakers to keep Canadian animals out of the United States until they receive assurances from beef export markets and the OIE that the United States wouldn't lose its negligible status should older Canadian animals enter U.S. commerce and become available for export.
It's a compelling argument, save for one flaw: Japan and South Korea don't necessarily subscribe to OIE standards. Otherwise, Japan would be importing U.S. product from animals of all ages, and South Korea would have opened its borders to both boneless and bone-in U.S. product.
Standard procedures
Johanns & Co. are betting that Asian trade partners will reconsider once the United States aligns itself with OIE standards, ostensibly by resuming imports of older Canadian animals. "We need to follow the science and treat our own trading partners the way that we expect to be treated," says Hodges. "Consider how difficult it would be to persuade Japan to open its markets to older U.S. animals if we don't grant older Canadian animals access to U.S. markets."
"Well, the Japanese are smart enough to figure out that that's just plain putting politics ahead of science," says R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard.
"There's always a political aspect that creeps into trade," Hodges concedes. "Inevitably any rule has political and economic consequences. But in this case, we're also saying follow the science - the guidelines promulgated by the World Organization for Animal Health - which indicate if appropriate risk mitigation steps [for BSE] have been taken, countries should be evaluated accordingly. And let me assure you, the United States and Canada have taken steps that far exceed those outlined in OIE standards."
And, in Canada's case, arguably stumbled. Many of its programs meet or exceed OIE standards, but Canada has had less success in the area of ruminant-to-ruminant feed bans.
"The United States should not allow the importation of older Canadian cattle until Canada has significantly strengthened its ban," says R-CALF President Max Thornsberry, who also chairs the R-CALF USA animal health committee.
Canada knows it. In a case of action speaking louder than words, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency plans to ban specified risk materials from all animals, pet foods and fertilizers - not just those destined for cattle - to avoid the risk of inadvertent cross-contamination of feed on farms and ranches.
The rule, which takes effect July 12 and surpasses U.S. firewalls, effectively closes what critics say has been a longstanding loophole. Indeed, the rule purports to reduce the risk of BSE infection by 99.8 percent, as compared to 90 percent under current regulations.
Canada hasn't been shy in admitting the move is intended to help reopen export markets, but as with its original 1997 ban, "it will take many years before we can test the efficacy of those improvements," Bullard says.
But it's that date in the past - March 1, 1999 - that has prompted the National Farmers Union, the Arkansas Beef Council and others to join the choir, even if Bullard may sound off-key when he says Canada's nine BSE cases amount to "a widespread epidemic that spans several provinces over a decade."
An epidemic, counters Hodges, isn't six or seven or eight animals, but tens of thousands of them.
"Look, the data shows that the number of cases is increasing rather decreasing," says Bullard. "There have been six in the last 14 months alone. And given the size of its herd, Canada continues to test animals in numbers well below those specified by OIE guidelines, which call for 187,000 animals between the ages of 4 and 7 annually. Well, last year Canada tested 60,000 of those animals and discovered five cases. Compare that to the original USDA rule designating Canada a low-risk region for BSE. It clearly states that no cases will be found in cattle born after Canada's 1997 feed ban, never mind the 1999 date [that was later indicated]."
One of the more vexing issues for Bullard and others is that, in accordance with revised OIE standards, BSE is less a numbers game than one prescribing a set of interlocking safeguards against the disease. So each potential trade partner must evaluate the efficacy of a plan. "In terms of risk management, the question of what's acceptable and what isn't ultimately lies with USDA," says Hodges. "It's not about the numbers, it's about the measures that Canada has put in place," says Alain Charette, CFIA spokesman. "Any questions about what the United States can expect from Canada is for the United States to answer. "Accountants," he says, "aren't going to be happy."
How safe are older Canadian animals? The U.S. beef industry may well soon find out as Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns reissues a rule to allow them into U.S. commerce.
By John Gregerson, editor
There's just one little problem with a voluminous USDA document seeking to ease restrictions on imports of Canadian cattle into the United States, as well as a corresponding proposal, issued in January, essentially seeking the same.
Both documents conclude that by the time dawn broke on March 2, 1999, Canada had swept the last of its ruminant feed out of its silos and storage sheds, its troughs and its truck beds. Any animal born after March 1, the documents hold, is unlikely to have consumed any prion-infected feed, and therefore eligible to mosey into U.S. commerce. Fine, but for the fact that three of the last four Canadian animals diagnosed with bovine spongiform encephalopathy were born from one to four years after those silos and sheds ostensibly were cleared of potentially infective feed.
Residue is one explanation that's been proffered, and indeed, it is an apt metaphor for a problem that refuses to go away, no matter how many government documents suggest otherwise. To be sure, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns has left a prodigious paper trail, first with a rule designating Canada a minimum risk region for BSE, at least by the reckoning of OIE standards, then with a series of studies indicating that all's clear on the Canadian front. Problem is, virtually every time USDA prepares to reopen U.S. markets to older Canadian animals, an older Canadian animal is diagnosed with BSE.
Four years and counting
The most troubling case was uncovered late last July, a 4-year-old animal from the province of Alberta. Two weeks later, in mid-August, it was back to the drawing board for Johanns, who had no choice but to pull the plug on a proposed rule that would have opened U.S. borders to Canadian cattle older than 30 months. No sooner did the rule resurface in January than an Alberta bull was diagnosed with BSE. Its approximate age: 6 years, meaning the animal likely was born in 2001, well past the March 1999 date, to say nothing of August 1997, when Canada first implemented its ruminant-to-ruminant feed ban.
Under the USDA rule, the animal's age would have made it eligible for export, just as the 4-year-old animal would have been. The difference is, this time USDA isn't backpedaling. Word on the bull is that it is "consistent in both age and location with other cases found in Canada."
By that, USDA means consistent "with certain [disease] clusters [located] around certain feed sources," says Jim Hodges, president of the American Meat Institute Foundation. The short version, he explains, is that at one time a BSE-infected Canadian animal apparently passed into Alberta's rendering or feed distribution chains, thus enabling BSE to ripple - or "amplify" - through the Alberta herd over a period of time.
The question is, how many herd members, and how much time? Hodges, among others, doesn't care to speculate, though it is the million-dollar question insofar as USDA's rule goes.
Fact is, there is far more at stake than a million here or a million there, with most of it poised to circulate in Asian markets far away from American prairies. Hodges is uneasy quantifying the direct economic impact the rule would have on U.S. processing operations, but suggests those older Canadian animals wouldn't make or break many domestic businesses save for a handful of slaughterhouses scattered across western northern-tier states.
At least four U.S. senators don't agree, having written to Johanns in early February that "increasing U.S. imports of Canadian cattle and beef would have a significant negative impact on the economic well-being of American cattle producers." Predictably, the four senators, who include Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), hail from R-CALF country, home of the independent producer, who detractors allege barters in science in order to advance his so-called protectionist agenda.
Which is why it is surprising to see the four senators play the economic card - even if their argument is somewhat dubious - owing to the fact that it relies upon a different animal, meaning price drops associated with U.S. imports of younger Canadian animals.
Nevertheless, the letter covers its bases, on the one hand acknowledging the bigger prize lies in Asia, and on the other warning that any muddying of trade waters with older Canadian animals will make "regaining our lost export markets even more difficult," especially in the event the rule leads to "the importation of additional BSE-infected animals from Canada."
For the United States, the issue also may mark the difference between a "negligible risk" status for BSE under OIE standards or merely "controlled risk," the designation it currently shares with Canada. Negligible risk status requires that the youngest animal with BSE be born more than 11 years ago, a claim Canada can't make, but the United States arguably can. So, when they aren't asking their congressmen to deep-six the Canadian rule, R-CALF members are urging lawmakers to keep Canadian animals out of the United States until they receive assurances from beef export markets and the OIE that the United States wouldn't lose its negligible status should older Canadian animals enter U.S. commerce and become available for export.
It's a compelling argument, save for one flaw: Japan and South Korea don't necessarily subscribe to OIE standards. Otherwise, Japan would be importing U.S. product from animals of all ages, and South Korea would have opened its borders to both boneless and bone-in U.S. product.
Standard procedures
Johanns & Co. are betting that Asian trade partners will reconsider once the United States aligns itself with OIE standards, ostensibly by resuming imports of older Canadian animals. "We need to follow the science and treat our own trading partners the way that we expect to be treated," says Hodges. "Consider how difficult it would be to persuade Japan to open its markets to older U.S. animals if we don't grant older Canadian animals access to U.S. markets."
"Well, the Japanese are smart enough to figure out that that's just plain putting politics ahead of science," says R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard.
"There's always a political aspect that creeps into trade," Hodges concedes. "Inevitably any rule has political and economic consequences. But in this case, we're also saying follow the science - the guidelines promulgated by the World Organization for Animal Health - which indicate if appropriate risk mitigation steps [for BSE] have been taken, countries should be evaluated accordingly. And let me assure you, the United States and Canada have taken steps that far exceed those outlined in OIE standards."
And, in Canada's case, arguably stumbled. Many of its programs meet or exceed OIE standards, but Canada has had less success in the area of ruminant-to-ruminant feed bans.
"The United States should not allow the importation of older Canadian cattle until Canada has significantly strengthened its ban," says R-CALF President Max Thornsberry, who also chairs the R-CALF USA animal health committee.
Canada knows it. In a case of action speaking louder than words, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency plans to ban specified risk materials from all animals, pet foods and fertilizers - not just those destined for cattle - to avoid the risk of inadvertent cross-contamination of feed on farms and ranches.
The rule, which takes effect July 12 and surpasses U.S. firewalls, effectively closes what critics say has been a longstanding loophole. Indeed, the rule purports to reduce the risk of BSE infection by 99.8 percent, as compared to 90 percent under current regulations.
Canada hasn't been shy in admitting the move is intended to help reopen export markets, but as with its original 1997 ban, "it will take many years before we can test the efficacy of those improvements," Bullard says.
But it's that date in the past - March 1, 1999 - that has prompted the National Farmers Union, the Arkansas Beef Council and others to join the choir, even if Bullard may sound off-key when he says Canada's nine BSE cases amount to "a widespread epidemic that spans several provinces over a decade."
An epidemic, counters Hodges, isn't six or seven or eight animals, but tens of thousands of them.
"Look, the data shows that the number of cases is increasing rather decreasing," says Bullard. "There have been six in the last 14 months alone. And given the size of its herd, Canada continues to test animals in numbers well below those specified by OIE guidelines, which call for 187,000 animals between the ages of 4 and 7 annually. Well, last year Canada tested 60,000 of those animals and discovered five cases. Compare that to the original USDA rule designating Canada a low-risk region for BSE. It clearly states that no cases will be found in cattle born after Canada's 1997 feed ban, never mind the 1999 date [that was later indicated]."
One of the more vexing issues for Bullard and others is that, in accordance with revised OIE standards, BSE is less a numbers game than one prescribing a set of interlocking safeguards against the disease. So each potential trade partner must evaluate the efficacy of a plan. "In terms of risk management, the question of what's acceptable and what isn't ultimately lies with USDA," says Hodges. "It's not about the numbers, it's about the measures that Canada has put in place," says Alain Charette, CFIA spokesman. "Any questions about what the United States can expect from Canada is for the United States to answer. "Accountants," he says, "aren't going to be happy."