TOKYO (AP) – U.S. and Japanese negotiators struck a deal Saturday to allow limited imports of American beef into Japan for the first time since Tokyo closed its billion-dollar market last year over a mad cow disease scare.

The pact also calls for resuming exports of Japanese beef to the United States, banned after Tokyo discovered a case of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, in 2001. BSE can be fatal to humans who eat contaminated beef.

Japan banned U.S. beef imports in December 2003 after the discovery of one case of mad cow disease in Washington state. At the time, Japan was the most lucrative overseas market for American beef, with sales exceeding $1.7 billion in 2003.

The pact also will lead to the resumption of Japanese beef exports to the United States. The agreement ended three days of contentious talks.

U.S. beef was popular in Japan as a cheaper and more plentiful alternative to pricey domestic meat. It should appear in restaurants and supermarkets within “a matter of weeks,” said J.B. Penn, the Agriculture Department’s undersecretary for farm and foreign agricultural services.

The agreement requires both sides to inspect slaughterhouses and change regulations before Tokyo would allow the import of beef products from cows younger than 21 months old. Imports of U.S. beef products from older animals could resume after July 2005, the two sides said in a joint statement.

“We hope following that, we can return to the normal trade patterns we had before BSE was discovered,” Penn said.

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ann M. Veneman called the agreement “a very important milestone in our returning to normal.”

The agreement was welcomed by American beef producers.

“This is welcome news for U.S cattlemen and for the U.S. economy,” the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association said in a statement.

But Jan Lyons, NCBA President and a beef producer from Manhattan, Kan., said, “Cattlemen must remember, however, that today’s news doesn’t mean the United States will instantly regain the same market share in Japan that we had. We have a lot of work to do to regain our position,”

U.S. and Japanese officials reviewed a Japanese proposal – awaiting Tokyo’s final approval – to exempt younger cows from testing, Penn said. They also narrowed differences over methods to authenticate the age of cattle, he said.

Japan had demanded that all U.S. beef come only from animals with a birth record. But U.S. beef producers do not keep such records for every animal, relying instead on birth records for herds and a grading system that uses tenderness of the meat to judge age.

“Our production system simply doesn’t lend itself to having a birth certificate for each and every animal,” Penn said.

Under the agreement, officials from both sides will discuss next July whether to drop all restrictions on beef, Penn said.

Japan checks all domestically bred cows entering the food chain and had demanded that the United States adopt similar blanket testing. Washington dismissed such testing as costly and unreliable in detecting infections among young cows.

The talks came as a dairy cow from western Japan tested positive for the bovine disease in preliminary tests conducted early Saturday, an official said. If confirmed, the 6-year-old cow from Mie prefecture (state) would be Japan’s 15th animal with the fatal brain-wasting illness.

AP-ES-10-23-04 1441EDT