Despite signing a protocol lifting the ban on US bone-in beef and beef products from cattle younger than 30 months, excluding cow tonsils and the distal ileum of the small intestine, Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said yesterday that the government would not lift the ban on ground beef and beef offal from the US.
“There will be no ground [US] beef and [US] beef offal on the market ... According to my understanding, no one will apply to import [the products], and the Department of Health [DOH] will reject their requests on the basis of related rules and regulations,” Wu told reporters at the Executive Yuan, without elaborating.
In an attempt to ease public concern over the safety of US beef, Wu responded positively to the request made by some local governments, lawmakers and consumer groups to exclude ground beef and internal organs from imports by imposing administrative measures.
“It’s neither a problem of risk assessment, nor food safety. The problem now is that people doubt about the products. The government has to face [their doubts] squarely,” Wu said.
Under DOH administrative measures, importers will be required to join an association through which they can apply to import ground meat and internal organs, Executive Yuan Spokesman Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) said.
The government said previously that it would also ban the import of brains, spinal cords, eyes and skulls from cattle less than 30 months of age in the supplementary clause under the protocol between Taiwan and the US.
However, the government did not make the supplementary clause public.
The protocol states that the four products, defined as non-specific risk materials or without food-safety hazards, can be imported. It says that as long as importers do not place orders and these items are detected during the import inspection process, the DOH may return the box or boxes.
The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) declined to respond directly to Wu’s statement, except to say that the details of the deal were contained in the protocol signed by the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office (TECRO) and AIT.
AIT press officer Christopher Kavanagh reiterated Washington’s stance that US beef has been deemed by international standards created by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) to be safe for human consumption and that the public should look at the science-based evidence.
At the legislature yesterday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yang Li-huan (楊麗環) asked Department of Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良) what the government would do if a case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), the human form of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, was discovered in Taiwan because of US beef consumption.
Yang appeared to be unaware of the implications of the scenario she described given the disease’s incubation period.
Yaung said the ban would be immediately resumed if vCJD were discovered in Taiwan.
“We can do so immediately by following our own food regulations and laws,” Yaung said.
Yaung, however, urged the public not to panic about US beef because the policy to allow imports was made after careful consideration.
“The potential danger from eating US beef is almost zero,” he said.
KMT Legislator Sun Ta-chien (孫大千) was not happy with that.
“When you say it is ‘almost safe,’ you mean there is still a risk,” Sun said.
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