Meatpacker sues feds for the right to test its own herd for mad cow disease

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http://www.unknownnews.org/060324f0322madcow.html

 

 

Meatpacker sues feds for the right to test its own herd for mad cow

disease

 

 

by Libby Quaid, Associated Press

 

March 22, 2006

 

WASHINGTON -- A Kansas meatpacker has sparked an industry fight by

proposing testing all the company's cattle for mad cow disease.

 

Creekstone Farms Premium Beef wants to look for the disease in every

animal it processes. The Agriculture Department has said no.

Creekstone says it intends to sue the department.

 

" Our customers, particularly our Asian customers, have requested it

over and over again, " chief executive John Stewart said in an

interview Wednesday. " We feel strongly that if customers are asking

for tested beef, we should be allowed to provide that. "

 

Creekstone planned a news conference Thursday in Washington to discuss

the lawsuit.

 

The department and larger meat companies oppose comprehensive testing,

saying it cannot assure food safety. Testing rarely detects the

disease in younger animals, the source of most meat.

 

" There isn't any nation in the world that requires 100 percent

testing, " department spokesman Ed Loyd said Wednesday.

 

Larger companies worry that Japanese buyers would insist on costly

testing and that a suspect result might scare consumers away from

eating beef.

 

Japan was the most lucrative foreign market for American beef until

the first U.S. case of mad cow disease prompted a ban in 2003. The ban

cost Creekstone nearly one-third of its sales and led the company to

slash production and lay off about 150 people, Stewart said.

 

When Japan reopened its market late last year, Creekstone resumed

shipments. Japan has halted shipments again, after finding American

veal cuts with backbone. These cuts are eaten in the U.S. but are

banned in Japan.

 

Stewart said that when trade resumes with Japan, Creekstone is in a

position to rehire the laid-off workers and then some.

 

Creekstone would need government certification for its plan to test

each animal at its Arkansas City, Kan., plant. The department refused

the license request in 2004.

 

The U.S. has been testing around 1 percent of the 35 million head of

cattle slaughtered each year, although officials have been planning to

scale back that level of testing.

 

An industry official said the U.S. testing program should reassure

customers inside and outside the United States.

 

" The U.S. risk of BSE is miniscule and declining, our proactive

prevention strategies have worked and the safety of American beef is

assured, " said J. Patrick Boyle, president of the American Meat Institute.

 

He was referring to the formal name for mad cow disease, bovine

spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE.

 

While individual companies in Japan may want comprehensive testing,

Japan's government is not asking for it.

 

Japan does have lingering questions about the shipment of prohibited

veal, even after the U.S. sent a lengthy report to Tokyo explaining

the mistake was an isolated incident. The report blamed the company,

Brooklyn-based Atlantic Veal & Lamb, and a government inspector for

misunderstanding new rules for selling beef to Japan.

 

Japan's agriculture minister, Shoichi Nakagawa, said Wednesday that

further talks are needed.

 

" We do want to keep going back and forth with the U.S. over this

issue, " he said. " We want the U.S. side to squarely answer our questions. "

 

The Agriculture Department announced Wednesday evening it will send a

team led by Acting Under Secretary Chuck Lambert to Tokyo next week

for talks.

 

The U.S. has had three cases of mad cow disease. The first appeared in

December 2003 in a Washington state cow that had been imported from

Canada. The second was confirmed last June in a Texas-born cow, and

the third was confirmed last week in an Alabama cow.

 

Japan has had two dozen cases of BSE.

 

Mad cow disease is a brain-wasting ailment in cattle. In people,

eating meat products contaminated with BSE is linked to more than 150

deaths worldwide, mostly in Britain, from a deadly human nerve

disorder, variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease.

 

As originally published