South Korea ...
South Korea
More Details On Market Reopening Emerge
More details are now available on the beef “initial import protocol” announced last week by the South Korean Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the USDA.
South Korea will permit “deboned skeletal muscle meat from animals that were slaughtered at less than 30 months of age.” Korea will not allow imports of U.S. beef diaphragm (skirts), offal such as tongue, viscera, trimmings and cheek meat, processed meat products (e.g. sausages and hamburger patties) and ground meat. The agreement, of course, mandates the removal of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE)-designated specified risk material from all cattle regardless of age. South Korea will send a team to conduct an audit of the U.S. system. The team will inspect a representative sample of U.S. plants, and review USDA Agriculture Marketing Service beef export verification plan procedures and the Food Safety and Inspection Service’s (FSIS) plant inspection system.
South Korea reserves the right to suspend imports of U.S. beef under certain circumstances. These include cases of BSE being discovered in U.S. animals born after April 1998 (eight months after the ban on feeding ruminant protein to ruminants), a breakdown in U.S. control measures, continued violation of those controls or a change in international scientific belief suggesting that BSE infectivity could occur in muscle meat.
Mexican cattle must be in the U.S. for at least 100 days before slaughter if the meat is destined for South Korea, but this is an existing FSIS rule unconnected with the agreement. Beef from Canadian cattle are not eligible for export to Korea.
The agreement was reached on January 13. The Koreans expect to take two weeks preparing procedures for its implementation. The procedures will be published in the Korean equivalent of the Federal Register around January 27, and a 20-day comment period will follow. The system audit should then begin around February 16 and could last about two weeks (March 2). Giving the inspectors time to prepare and present their report, the first shipments of U.S. beef to Korea are likely to leave the U.S. in the second or third week of March.
South Korea
More Details On Market Reopening Emerge
More details are now available on the beef “initial import protocol” announced last week by the South Korean Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the USDA.
South Korea will permit “deboned skeletal muscle meat from animals that were slaughtered at less than 30 months of age.” Korea will not allow imports of U.S. beef diaphragm (skirts), offal such as tongue, viscera, trimmings and cheek meat, processed meat products (e.g. sausages and hamburger patties) and ground meat. The agreement, of course, mandates the removal of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE)-designated specified risk material from all cattle regardless of age. South Korea will send a team to conduct an audit of the U.S. system. The team will inspect a representative sample of U.S. plants, and review USDA Agriculture Marketing Service beef export verification plan procedures and the Food Safety and Inspection Service’s (FSIS) plant inspection system.
South Korea reserves the right to suspend imports of U.S. beef under certain circumstances. These include cases of BSE being discovered in U.S. animals born after April 1998 (eight months after the ban on feeding ruminant protein to ruminants), a breakdown in U.S. control measures, continued violation of those controls or a change in international scientific belief suggesting that BSE infectivity could occur in muscle meat.
Mexican cattle must be in the U.S. for at least 100 days before slaughter if the meat is destined for South Korea, but this is an existing FSIS rule unconnected with the agreement. Beef from Canadian cattle are not eligible for export to Korea.
The agreement was reached on January 13. The Koreans expect to take two weeks preparing procedures for its implementation. The procedures will be published in the Korean equivalent of the Federal Register around January 27, and a 20-day comment period will follow. The system audit should then begin around February 16 and could last about two weeks (March 2). Giving the inspectors time to prepare and present their report, the first shipments of U.S. beef to Korea are likely to leave the U.S. in the second or third week of March.