Japan is ready to ease the age restriction for US beef
During the last decade and a half, US beef exports to Japan have been subject to different restrictions, from a total ban to cattle age limits, due to the BSE disease that affected the North American country in the past.
At this point, Japan has a 30-month age restriction for US beef imports but that ceiling is about to be modified, according to Drovers magazine. The research unit of the Food Safety Commission has considered the potential impacts of removing the age limit since April, in response to continued pressure from the U.S. to remove the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE)-linked age restriction, informs the magazine.
Japan has been America’s number one beef export destination for years. Prior to the BSE-related ban in 2003, Japan was importing $1.3 billion in U.S. beef. In 2017, Japan imported more than $1.5 billion from U.S. beef suppliers, and through September of 2018, it had already imported $1.3 billion.
Removing the age restrictions could further help the U.S. relative to competitiveness in the Japanese market as it seeks to compete against Australia with both Japan and Australia in the revised Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, dubbed CPTPP.
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