Major markets for U.S. beef from Canada to Japan stayed open to imports on Wednesday after the first U.S. discovery of mad cow disease in six years on assurances that rigorous surveillance had safeguarded the food system.
U.S. live cattle futures rode back into the black after posting their biggest drop in seven months the previous day.
On reporting the discovery of a California dairy cow infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) on Tuesday, U.S. authorities quickly told consumers and importers around the world there was no danger the meat would enter the food chain.
Mexico, Korea, Japan, Canada and the European Union said they would continue to import U.S. beef, although two major South Korean retailers halted sales.
Benchmark June live cattle futures on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange were up 0.9 cent at 112.45 cents per lb at 1424 GMT, still near their lowest in nine months after tumbling by the daily 3-cent trading limit on Tuesday.
Samples from the infected cow have been sent to laboratories in Canada and Britain for final confirmation, Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) said in a statement, adding that the case was unlikely to affect the current USDA “controlled risk” categorization for mad cow disease.
“According to USDA statements, the steps taken so far are consistent with OIE standards,” it added.
Russia’s health watchdog said it could consider restrictions on U.S. imports but that it was waiting for more information on the outbreak and the planned U.S. response before taking a decision.
Korean retailer Lotte Mart, a unit of Lotte Shopping Co., said it had suspended sales due to what it said was “customer concerns”, as did Home Plus, a unit of Britain’s Tesco PLC.
Three previous cases of mad cow disease were confirmed in the Unites States between 2003 and 2006. Memories were still sharp of the first case in 2003, which caused a $3 billion drop in U.S. exports. It took until 2011 before those exports fully recovered.
Experts said the latest case was “atypical”, meaning it was a rare occurrence in which a cow contracts the disease spontaneously, rather than through the feed supply.
They said the dairy cow had not been eaten by other animals and there was no risk of the disease being spread and estimated the chance of an animal spontaneously contracting the disease at about one in a million.
The USDA is still tracing the exact life of the infected animal, and the carcass of the cow is under quarantine and will be destroyed.
The cow was found at a rendering plant, which processes diseased or sick animals into mainly non-edible products for use in products such as soap or glue.
Mexico, which buys more U.S. beef than any other country, said it has no plans to halt imports and that it would maintain the same regimen of inspections for trade across the border.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency said trade would not be affected in one of the top importers of U.S. beef.
The case also will not affect negotiations on Japan’s possible membership in a U.S.-led Pacific trade pact, Tokyo said on Wednesday. Japan already only allows imports of U.S. and Canadian beef from cattle aged 20 months or less.
Vietnam, which suspended U.S. beef imports between December 2003 and September 2011, also said it had not changed its policy on U.S. beef in response to the latest news.
In the U.S. domestic market, companies are still smarting from the fallout over a ground beef filler that critics called “pink slime”, made from scraps of beef sprayed with ammonia gas to kill bacteria. The product was pulled from grocery store shelves and forced one producer to idle several factories and another to file for bankruptcy.
You are right, you are not right and you have partly the right idea. How is that for an anewsr? It is not an easy question to anewsr. You will have to anewsr the following questions for yourself. 1./ A family of three.How much milk do you drink? I drink/use nearly a gallon a day by myself. Some people use less than a cup a day. How much are you using?A cow will produce 3-5 gallons a day (Dexter) to 20 gallons a day (Holstien) to somewhere in between for a Jersey or a cross.I have a Jersey/Gelbvieh(Gelp-fee)cross heifer and I will be keeping her calf on her when she freshens. The calf will take some milk and I will take the rest for my needs. The cow will produce as much as the demand on her is theroretically. If I get WAY too much milk, the rest will go to feed the hogs as a supplement. 2./ Do you prefer goat milk to cow milk or cow milk to goat milk? I actually do not care for the richness of goat milk in a glass or on my morning oatmeal. In the past I have found goat milk to be perfectly nasty with Fig Newton cookies and will not try that combination ever again. I prefer cow milk for those food items, however, I prefer the goat milk for many of my cheeses, carmel and gelato. I also only use real butter in my kitchen and Jersey is cream of the crop’. Goat milk is self homogenized and will not easily seperate as cow milk will. Nubians have the highest butterfat generally, with some individuals at 5.2% butterfat. Jerseys are about 5.3%. Each individual within a breed can vary as well. My milk goat is a Boer/Nubian/Saanan cross and gives large quanities of excellent milk.. without kidding, as she is a precocious milker. The grass turns green in the spring and she thinks she needs to produce milk. What are you prepared to do with the offspring? I used to butcher all my buck kids. All calves, except for replacement heifers are butchered when they are about 12-18 months. 3./ Will you, the significant other or the kids be milking? A Jersey cow usually have a weight range of between 800 and 1,200 pounds. A goat is not nearly that weight (90-135#)and can easily be handled by kids. Will you be milking by hand or with a milking machine? That also could make a HUGE difference in your decision. You may chose to only want to milk out a goat instead of a fully lactating cow. 4./ Fencing. Let me tell you about a Jersey cow.. the former mother of my heifer calf. I had more problems keeping that steeplechaser cow inside my 4 and 5 stand barbwire fencing in one year than I ever had with my goats since 1996. When my goat is not in a log fence in the barnyard, she has a 30 foot leash and she is moved daily. Only once has she gotten into my garden and it was sorely my fault. She just took advantage of my negligence at the gate latching. The former milking Jersey cow however, is nicely tucked inside my freezer to escape no more. I used to have nice tight fences before she came along, but her former home didn’t and they taught her that fences were made to be broken, or jumped.. or squeezed through. The trick with goats is .. they like to stand and look over the fence. Either give them something to stand on (like a rail at an old fashioned western tavern before the brawl) or put something there like an electric fence to keep them from standing on it about 6 out at goat chest height on the fencing poles. NEVER pet a goat over the fence, they like to be petted. Petting them encourages them to stand on the fence to be petted. Even on my log rails, with not petting the goats over the fence, they do not stand on the rails. Have a cheapo fence from the beginning and they learn to get out.. well.. Blame them from learning they can escape due to human mismanagement of the fence? When I first had goats, I had no fence. I tied the queen goat up and they all stayed with her. Goats are browsers, so you DO have to move them 1-2 times a day. 4./ Kidding problems are usually easier to deal with than dealing with a calving issue. Goats are generally easier to transport for whatever reason you need to transport them. It is generally nicer to clean out a goat barn instead of the cow barn. A shave all my milking animals down to a show cut and they get bathed every 2 weeks. The udders are clipped with a #40 blade (Oster). Goats feet need trimming more, but cow feet can be harder to do. 5./ Train both species on a halter and socialize them to people. With my goats or cow I can go out into the pasture with a book and use them as a warm backrest to read in the sunshine if they are laying down chewing cud. They like going for walks with people on their leadropes. 7./ It is also your preference if you decide you are a goat-person over a cow-person as well. A cow will be a 15-20 year investment (time as well as money) and a goat will be with you for 7-12ish years. A cow will give you meat in 12-18 months and goat kids, you can get up to 3-ish per doe per year and you can butcher them out at 4 months (my preference) and get 40lbsx3 animals per year. 8./ Both are herd animals and should have something of a herd animal with it. My horse and heifer are now buddies in the back pasture, but before the heifer and the goat were not to be seperated. So if you have goats, you should have 2 at least and if you have a cow, you may not need 2 bovines, but maybe buddy it up with something else for a friend. (Like a goat?)9./ You do not say where you are. Some lands are capable of having 1 cow/calf pair per 2 acres and some lands are about 40-60 acres per cow/calf pair. Do you have more pasture or more browse? Are you going to buy all or part of your feed for the animals? How harsh are the winters? How hot are the summers? Do you need extreme shelter for them to warm or shade them? 10./Water. Do you have to haul water? I did for 3 years until the well was drilled. Do you have a faucet or will you need to haul multiple 5 gallon buckets?Good luck and I hope you find your new family member soon. Whatever you get, they do become part of your family as they are feeding your family. tenzicut