Japan and the United States last week held working-level talks in San Francisco on relaxing Japan's restrictions on U.S. beef imports, the first bilateral dialogue since August 2007. According to Japanese Agriculture Minister Masahiko Yamada, the Japanese government was eager to hold in-depth discussions based on scientific grounds, as it has always done in the past, adding, "Food safety is very important and we would like to hold thorough discussions based on scientific knowledge."
Japan has restricted beef imports from the United States since the first U.S. case of mad cow disease was discovered in December 2003, and currently bans imports of U.S. beef from cattle aged over 20 months.
Washington has been urging Tokyo to gradually soften the rule by easing the age cap to 30 months and eventually lift the ban entirely but Tokyo has maintained a cautious stance. The two sides agreed in April this year to restart the talks when then farm minister Hirotaka Akamatsu met with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in Tokyo. But scheduling of the talks had been delayed, as Japan's farm ministry had been dealing with the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease among livestock in Miyazaki Prefecture, which came to an end late last month.
When Vilsack met with Japanese officials in April, he also asked them to address U.S. industry complaints that Japan should not respond to minor infractions of the import protocol that governs U.S.-Japan beef trade by making a given U.S. plant ineligible for export. The beef market access issue "remains a high priority for the United States and the U.S. objective remains a framework that is consistent with science and international standards," Vilsack said after his April meetings.
Vilsack also floated the 30-month age limit as the first step in a process that ultimately must lead to full market access without age restrictions. The goal for USDA remains Japan's full compliance with World Animal Health Organization (OIE) guidelines.
During last week's talks, Japan was represented by officials from the Agriculture Ministry and the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, while the U.S. side was represented by USDA officials.
In addition to Japan, the United States also is engaged in talks with China and Mexico to more fully open those beef markets. The United States also has committed to South Korea that it will not accept less in those other negotiations than the current access the United States enjoys in South Korea, which is access for beef from cattle younger than 30 months of age.
U.S. industry sources estimate that if the market was open to cattle 30 months and younger it would cover more than 95 percent of beef that U.S. exporters could sell to Japan.
The United States has slowly regained some share in the Japanese market, but its exports remain at about 25 percent of the 2003 market share. Last year, Japan imported 91,467 tonnes of U.S. beef compared to 356,600 tonne of Australian beef.
