Japan rebuffs U.S. requests for early talks on U.S. beef imports The Japanese government has rejected a U.S. request for early talks about easing restrictions on American beef imports, an official said Thursday. “We are not in a stage to accept consultations toward reviewing the trade conditions for now,” Yoshio Kobayashi, vice minister of the Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries Ministry, said in a statement on the ministry's Web site. Kobayashi said it was too early to enter talks with the United States as Japan's verification of U.S. beef exporting conditions had not been completed. He did not indicate when the verification would be finished. The minister's comments were in response to a letter from the U.S. urging Japan to ease its import conditions, the ministry said. A letter stating Tokyo's position was sent to Washington on Wednesday, it added. After meeting U.S. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns in Washington earlier this month, Japan's Agriculture Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka said Japan was still conducting “deliberations” on the safety of U.S. beef. Japan must also conduct an audit of American beef plants, study the results and make the information available to the public....
ND officials critical of proposed federal CWD program North Dakota animal health officials say a national program to control chronic wasting disease (CWD) in captive deer and elk is needed, but that it should not supercede tougher state programs. “States have eagerly awaited the release of a national CWD program; however, a program which does not allow states to retain the authority to protect both their wild and farmed cervids is irresponsible,” said Dr. Beth Carlson, deputy state veterinarian. “The national program should be used as a minimal guideline, just as other successful disease control and prevention programs have been used.” Carlson's comments on behalf of the North Dakota State Board of Animal Health (BOAH) are in response to proposed rules, published by the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, that would create a national CWD program. Carlson argued that states are better placed than the federal government to react to a disease outbreak....