TOKYO (AP) – Japan agreed today to lift its ban on U.S. beef imports – imposed early this year amid concerns over mad cow disease, the Asian nation’s agriculture ministry said.

The breakthrough resolves a thorny, long-running trade dispute between the allies and gives U.S. ranchers access to what was once their most lucrative export market. “Japan agreed to resume U.S. beef imports on the condition that we find no further problems during onsite inspections,” Ogura said, without giving further details about the inspections.

American beef shipments to Japan were halted in January after Japanese officials found a veal shipment that contained backbone, which Asian countries consider at risk for mad cow disease.

The cuts are eaten in the United States and other countries, but Japan’s rules are stricter.

The accord was worked out via a video conference directed by Japanese Agriculture Ministry’s consumption safety director, Hiroshi Nakagawa, and his U.S. Agriculture Department counterpart, Chuck Lambert, deputy undersecretary for marketing and regulatory programs.

U.S. negotiators had asked Japan to resume beef trade if similar mistakes could be prevented. If a violation is found, the U.S. wants Japan to restrict shipments only from an individual meatpacking company and not all U.S. processing companies.

At stake was a trading relationship worth millions of dollars to the U.S. beef industry. Japan’s market was worth $1.4 billion annually when it banned American beef in response to the first U.S. case of mad cow disease in 2003.

The U.S. Agriculture Department says that New York-based Atlantic Veal & Lamb and a government inspector misunderstood new trade rules when they allowed prohibited veal to be shipped to Japan.

American officials had been impatient for trade to resume, with several U.S. senators saying Tuesday they are introducing a bill that would impose trade sanctions if Japan does not reopen its market to U.S. beef by Aug. 31.

The agreement comes as Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi prepares to visit President Bush at the end of this month. The two leaders are scheduled to meet in Washington on June 29 and travel to Elvis Presley’s Graceland home in Memphis, Tenn., the next day.

Mad cow disease is medically known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. In humans, eating meat contaminated with BSE is linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, a rare and deadly nerve disease.

Copy the Story Link