Furious at a sudden announcement by the government on Monday night that it would conditionally lift a ban on US beef containing ractopamine residue, Taiwan Rural Front and student groups yesterday held a colorful protest on Ketagalan Boulevard.
The Executive Yuan announced that following analyses based on the conclusions of a technical advisory committee, the government would adopt a policy off “safe permission, segregation of pork and beef, mandatory labeling and viscera exclusion” and “conditionally lift the ban” on beef containing the feed additive ractopamine.
Throwing pieces of raw beef on signs with illustrations of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) dressed as Uncle Sam, with the words: “I want you to eat US beef” written on them, the protesters said that the administration was neglecting the public’s health, while humiliating the nation and forfeiting its sovereignty.
“We have to protect the people’s health and cannot allow the government to give in to political bullying over the US beef issue,” Taiwan Rural Front spokeswoman Tsai Pei-hui (蔡培慧) said.
Chen Ping-hsuan (陳平軒), a member of Taiwan Rural Front, said that as the technical advisory committee has not proven that ractopamine residue in humans is safe, the government should not prematurely allow US beef imports.
“Lifting the ban on US beef is not just a problem of public health, it also triggers problems of farmers being oppressed in the name of free trade,” Tsai said.
“If the government is trying to trade the import of US beef to gain benefits in the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement talks, then the injustice of this economic model will be reproduced again in the future,” Tsai added.
At the Consumers’ Foundation, Su Wei-shuo (蘇偉碩), a clinical psychiatrist who attended the third technical advisory committee meeting on Saturday, said no clear conclusions had been reached and that the meeting’s chairperson, Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Bao-ji (陳保基), had told them there would be a fourth meeting because they did not reach a consensus that day.
“The government said it would hold international conferences to discuss the matter next month or in May, but now they have already made a sudden decision,” he said.
“I feel like I’ve been robbed by the government, which distorted our conclusions,” Su said.
Su added that the conclusions quoted by Ma were not the same as the ones he heard during the meeting.
“We overthrew conclusions made at the second meeting because we figured that there was not enough scientific data to prove the impact of ractopamine residue on human health on a mass scale and therefore we could not calculate, with only estimates available, the long-term effects on humans,” Su said.
“However, we are certain that it does harm pigs by affecting their brains,” he added.
Su said the Executive Yuan quoted their conclusion as “the half-life of ractopamine in the human body is short [four hours] and 80 percent of it can be excluded after 24 hours,” but, in fact, “a short half-life does not tell us anything about its toxicity.”
Su also said that another specialist at the meeting even brought up research showing that babies under 18 months old could barely break down chemical substances, such as ractopamine, in their bodies.
The Consumers’ Foundation said that before there is enough research evidence and risk evaluations on the effects of ractopamine on the human body, the government should not lift the ban.
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