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USMEF sees Japan/China moving on US beef

The head of the U.S. Meat Export Federation expects Japan and China to relax restrictions on U.S. beef within the next six months. USMEF President and CEO Phil Seng, “Our expectation is that it would be no later than April 1st (2012) that Japan would be able to move beyond the 20 months.”

Seng calls that a conservative estimate which he also applies to China. “As Japan moves then there’ll be, I think what I would call a very strong possibility that we would see movement in China,” says Seng, “The U.S. and Chinese governments have already agreed that they need to meet more frequently.”

Japan indicated at the end of October that it was preparing to ease import restrictions on U.S. and Canadian beef.

“I’m not going to say how far north they will go of 20 months. I don’t want to box the Japanese in, in any way,” Seng added.

Seng told reporters that the Japanese appear to want to end some of the huge costs of testing cattle for BSE and are looking at other types of testing for their domestic herd.

Amid the aftermath of the March tsunami and resulting nuclear problems, Seng adds, Japanese consumer confidence in the domestic beef supply – which has always been extremely high – has been “severely eroded” opening up more opportunity for U.S. beef.