U.S. SENATE – U.S. Senator Steve Daines today expressed serious concerns with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service’s (FSIS) decision to lift its ban on Brazilian raw beef imports. Daines stressed the decision could put food safety standards at risk and questioned how USDA would monitor beef imports from Brazil moving forward.
“In 2017, USDA FSIS refused entry to approximately 2 million pounds of beef from Brazil and subsequently announced the suspension of all imports of fresh beef from Brazil due to public health concerns, poor sanitary conditions, and animal health issues,” Daines wrote. “Given that the United States halted Brazilian raw beef imports less than one year after Brazil was granted access in 2016, we have serious concerns about Brazil’s ability to maintain adequate food safety standards over the long run.”
Daines is a member of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over trade. To read the full letter, click HERE.
Background:
On June 22nd 2017, Daines praised the action taken by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue to halt Brazilian beef imports to the U.S.
During a 2017 hearing with Secretary Perdue, Daines called for thorough inspections of Brazilian beef by the Food Safety and Inspection Service, and that the policy of maintaining 100 percent re-inspection and testing of all meat imports from Brazil will be retained “indefinitely”.
Daines raised this issue in a letter to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in March of 2017 that demanded USDA “utilize all appropriate and legal means necessary to ensure that U.S. consumers are not at risk to any imported meat from Brazil or other countries.