Another shipment of U.S. beef was mistakenly exported to South Korea less than two weeks after Seoul lifted a brief ban on American beef imposed after two similar cases.
The United States government has confirmed that four beef packages sent to South Korea in early June were not processed for export, officials here said Tuesday.
"Richard Raymond, the under secretary for food safety at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, sent a letter confirming that Washington has found four packages containing 130 kilograms of beef that were sent by mistake," said Kang Mun-il, head of the National Veterinary Research and Quarantine Service.
Kang said the U.S. government ordered the meat exporter involved in the latest mishap not to handle further beef exports to South Korea, and censured the Food Safety and Inspection
Service official that issued the export permit without carefully checking the contents.
He said that the packages have been sent back and not circulated in the local market.
The packages arrived on June 2 and were processed by Tyson Foods Inc. The exporter that had mistakenly sent the meat was identified as Iowa-based Midamar Corp.
This is the third time that U.S. beef destined for the domestic market had been shipped to South Korea. Two shipments totaling 66.4 tons that arrived in South Korea on May 25 and 26 were found to have been sent by mistake. Seoul halted all quarantine inspections of U.S. beef from June 4 to June 8 so it could determine the exact reason for the mistaken shipment.
At that time Am-Mex Service Co., a California-based exporter, was cited for sending the wrong meat shipments.