TOKYO – Japan could from next month allow U.S. beef imports from cattle up to 30 months old, easing a restriction in place since 2005 on what was once the biggest market for U.S. exports.
The move, which Tokyo has been mulling since 2011 under pressure from Washington as concern over mad cow disease ebbed, would allow U.S. exporters like Cargill Inc and JBS USA Holdings Inc to regain lost market share in the world's number two beef importer.
"We're due to change the import restrictions on Feb. 1 if a medicine and food panel of experts gives us approval," Health Minister Norihisa Tamura was quoted as saying by a ministry spokesman.
The rules, imposed in 2005, permitted U.S. beef imports from cattle up to 20 months old after a total ban in 2003 following an outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). The country's imports of U.S. beef plunged by 60 percent to some 120,000 tonnes from 2001 to 2011, with Australian suppliers the main beneficiaries in an import market worth over $2 billion.
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