Inspection team downplays US beef woes

By Kim Tong-hyung

An inspection team composed of government officials and experts Thursday claimed that they found no grounds to worry about the safety of American beef.

Their all-clear declaration followed their return earlier in the day from a fact-finding trip to the United States after the report of mad cow case in California.

However, it remains to be seen whether their findings will quell the fears of consumers, who continue to question the credibility of the delegation’s activities especially due to its failure to visit the dairy where the sickened cow was raised.

Major grocery chains have already removed U.S. beef from their stores.

``The cow infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) was 127-months old. Official records and scientific data confirm it suffered from an atypical form of BSE,’’ said Agriculture Minister Suh Kyu-yong in a news conference Friday at the Gwacheong government complex, shortly after receiving a briefing from Joo E-suk, head of the inspection team.

``The infected cow was properly handled and buried in a designated place and definitely wasn’t converted as a food product. Through visits to numerous dairy farms, butcher facilities and animal feed factories, the inspection team has confirmed that the United States has a working and effective system for monitoring animal feed.’’

Korea imports U.S. beef from cows less than 30 months old and the inspection team’s activities confirmed there is no direct link between beef imported from America into Korea and the infected animal, the ministry said. The ministry promised to strengthen inspections of U.S. beef to appease public concern, although it didn’t provide details about how it would do so.

U.S. authorities said the dead California cow had what scientists call an atypical case of BSE, meaning that there was a random mutation in the animal rather than infected cattle feed was the cause.

Korea was among the countries that had imposed an import ban on U.S. beef in 2003 following the discovery of mad cow disease in the United States. The Lee Myung-bak government’s decision to resume imports in 2008 sparked nationwide protests that rattled the stability of the administration in its early days.

Korea is the world's fourth-largest importer of U.S. beef, buying 107,000 tons of the meat worth $563 million in 2011.