050433 US Provides More Data to Japan on Beef Safety\April 29, 2005Tokyo - The United States, which is pressuring Japan to resume importing US beef, provided data on how to determine the age of cows presumed to be free from madcow disease. At a meeting of government experts here, Japan in return said it would send a mission in early May to inspect how risky parts in cows are removed at US slaughterhouses, Japanese officials said. Japan, which was the largest importer of US beef before the ban was imposed, has been under intensifying US pressure, including threats of sanctions, to resume imports. Japan decided last October to exempt US cows aged 20 months or younger from testing for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) if high-risk parts such as brains and spinal cords were removed. But the main dispute has remained on how to verify the age of the cattle and the ban stayed in effect for some 16 months since it was imposed in December 2003 over safety concerns after a mad cow case was found in a US herd. At the meeting, the US side presented data on hundreds of cows to prove the effectiveness of the means of determining the age of cows by meat quality, the officials said. After assessing a report by the mission, the Tokyo government is expected to advise its commission on food safety in late May to authorise the exclusion of animals aged up to 20 months from BSE screening tests currently conducted on all slaughtered cattle in Japan. Japan is the only Asian country to have confirmed cases -- 17 so far -- of mad cow disease, which devastated Britain's cattle industry in the 1990s. "We are absolutely confident that we have taken measures necessary to ensure safety," Charles Lambert, who led the US delegation to the Tokyo meeting, said. Lambert, the deputy US agriculture undersecretary for marketing and regulatory programs, also said the US administration will "continue to offer additional information," according to the Kyodo news agency.
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