“We are very happy this long process has finally come to a conclusion, and ...

“We are very happy this long process has finally come to a conclusion, and U.S. beef can once again be exported to Japan. This has been a trying time for us, but also especially challenging to the many Japanese companies and individuals who have both relied on and enjoyed our products for nearly three decades,” U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) President & CEO Philip Seng said in a statement issued Dec. 12 following the announcement by the Japanese government that the ban on U.S. beef had been lifted.

“The U.S. beef industry now looks forward to supplying safe beef to the Japanese market that meets the stringent criteria of Japanese and U.S. regulators,” Seng added.

Two years of blood, sweat and tears finally came to an end on December 12 with the lifting of Japan’s ban on imports of U.S. beef. USMEF will relaunch U.S. beef with a consolidated air shipment that will arrive at Tokyo airport on Dec. 18, and plans are well under way for a campaign to win back the hearts and minds of Japanese consumers.

USMEF is hosting a luncheon of kansha — thankfulness — for those U.S. and Japanese scientists, trade association leaders, journalists, Foreign Agricultural Service officials, diplomats and U.S. industry representatives who were instrumental in achieving the reopening of our largest market on Dec. 21, and a Dec. 27 press conference will deliver the industry messages of gratitude and relief that the market is open and U.S. beef has been exonerated by Japanese science and government. The commitment of the industry to redouble its efforts to provide the U.S. beef products Japan’s trade and consumers want will not be doubted.

Since a team from Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare and Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) is visiting 10 U.S. beef plants this week and next to witness U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) procedures as exports resume, the timing of this press conference will also allow the government of Japan to discuss the team’s report (expected Dec. 26), and USMEF can answer any questions arising from it.

USMEF will open 2006 with a New Year’s greeting in Japan’s major newspapers with a positive message of goodwill and a prosperous new year for all concerned. The agreement to reopen the market restricts product to animals of 20 months of age or younger and stipulates an age-verification process that will limit eligible animals to perhaps as few as 10-15 percent of the U.S. herd, USMEF estimates.

USMEF rose to this challenge even before the opening of the market with a two-day new-cuts seminar in Omaha and Lincoln, sponsored by the Nebraska Beef Council, the Nebraska Corn Board, Nebraska Department of Agriculture and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln last month. Specifically geared to helping exporters prepare for re-entry into the Japanese market, the seminar was the U.S. rollout of “Project J,” a USMEF-Tokyo initiative to help customers learn to use 17 cuts not traditionally marketed in Japan. Beginning in January, high profile seminars will follow in Japan’s major cities focusing on these 17 new beef cuts developed by USMEF to increase U.S. beef exports bearing in mind the limited number of eligible cattle. USMEF believes the impending shortage of cattle can be met through the additional carcass utilization these 17 cuts will allow.

A new campaign will be launched at FoodEx, Japan’s most important trade show in March. USMEF, USDA officials and industry leaders will host a reception for the Japanese trade in which the guest of honor will be U.S. beef. USMEF’s public relations programs will be persistent and reinforced with the “Nama No Koi,” the fresh voice of the Japanese people – both in the trade and “on the street.” As leading Japanese companies begin to stock U.S. beef, its return to shelves and dinner plates will provide occasions for describing quality control by tactics such as having retail buyers and high-quality restaurant purchasing managers declaring why they have decided to stock U.S. beef. And, as consumers return to the meat case to buy U.S. beef, they will be asked to testify to their willingness to put U.S. beef back on their families’ tables.

Of course, USMEF didn’t spend 2004 and 2005 sulking in its tent, resting on past laurels. The last two years were a veritable beehive of activity in Japan and elsewhere. USMEF’s pork promotions continued unabated and another record year for U.S. pork exports is now certain. But within days of Japan’s U.S. beef ban, USMEF had set in motion a public relations campaign aimed at restoring Japan’s rightful place as the No. 1 market for U.S. beef. A new campaign of trade and public education efforts was launched at Japan's FoodEx show in March 2004. Seminars, trade shows, educational videos, and advertising aimed at consumers, the trade, academia and other trendsetters and decision makers were all part of a carefully orchestrated operation.

A USMEF 14-minute multilingual video developed in April 2004 was used repeatedly at trade shows, media briefings, exhibitions and educational seminars. To counter the Japanese emphasis on 100-percent testing, recognized by the scientific community as window dressing for consumers with no scientific merit, USMEF promoted the importance of understanding the disease and how the real answer to deal with it was through the measures adopted by the USDA and by the removal of specific risk materials (SRM), which in the unlikely event of future U.S. animals having the disease, removed the only parts of the animal shown to be able to pass it on. In August 2004, a second USMEF video detailed for Japan’s consumers how U.S. beef is produced and the measures taken by the U.S. government to ensure its safety. A full-color 20-page booklet was also produced and 10,000 copies distributed at a series of functions and events. A video on the reinforced surveillance methods and SRM removal followed.

USMEF brought teams of experts, buyers and reporters to the U.S. to demonstrate firsthand how the USDA and the industry were working to keep U.S. beef safe for its U.S. consumers just as much as for those in other countries. Japanese reporters produced their own videos and stories on the safety of U.S. beef, an approach which had an added resonance for the people of Japan. USMEF arranged for trustworthy voices from Japan’s scientific community to be heard on television and read in trade publications and major newspapers. When Seng led a delegation of U.S. industry leaders to meet with Japanese government officials and industry counterparts in December 2004, he emphasized the United States adheres to a stringent BSE surveillance system, including publicly reporting and documenting every violation to maintain a crystal-clear integrity. In October 2005 Seng delivered the same message to more than 30 journalists, major TV station reporters and embassy representatives from other leading beef exporting countries at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan in Tokyo. Finally, in December 2005 USMEF brought a television crew from NHK, Japan’s “BBC,” the public broadcasting organization reaching all areas of Japan, to U.S. beef plants to show how the U.S. industry complies with the needs of the Japanese market and to interview Seng.

Looking ahead, USMEF sees a challenging climb back to the top of Japan’s beef import market, but the federation and its members certainly know the way. USMEF believes in the safety of U.S. beef and thus believed a transparent, positive approach would prevail in the end. After two years it has.

The U.S. Meat Export Federation is the trade association responsible for developing international markets for the U.S. red meat industry and is funded by USDA, exporting companies, and the beef, pork, lamb, corn, sorghum and soybean checkoff programs.

– USMEF –