Beef supply in Singapore unaffected by US recall: AVA

Channel NewsAsia 19 Feb 08;

SINGAPORE : Beef supply in Singapore will not be affected by the beef recall in the United States.

The Agri-food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) said this was because the California slaughterhouse involved in the recall is not accredited by the AVA to export beef to Singapore.

In what is believed to be the largest such move in America, the US Department of Agriculture has recalled 65 million kilogrammes of frozen beef from a California slaughterhouse following alleged animal abuse practices.

This follows incriminating footage released by the US Humane Society last month.

The video showed workers at the plant using several abusive techniques, including ramming cattle with forklift blades, to force ill animals to stand up and pass a pre-slaughter inspection. - CNA/de

Brand of beef not sold in Singapore
Straits Times 19 Feb 08;

THE US beef recall will not affect Singaporean consumers, as the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority (AVA) said Westland/ Hallmark does not have approval to export to Singapore.

It also said that none of the company's products is brought into the Singapore market.

In fact, overall, very little American beef from any company finds its way here.

The AVA said that total beef imports last year amounted to 28,497 tonnes, out of which only 349 tonnes came from the United States.

The bulk of the beef brought into Singapore came from Brazil, which supplied 14,530 tonnes, and Australia, which provided 8,933 tonnes, while 4,585 tonnes came from New Zealand.

Beef taken off menu after largest US meat recall
Channel NewsAsia 18 Feb 08;

WASHINGTON, Feb 18, 2008 : Schools in Washington state and California took beef off the menu on Monday after a Californian meat packer recalled the largest amount of beef in US history.

But agriculture officials played down the risk to humans after Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing agreed to take back more than 143 million pounds of raw and frozen meet when it was found in violation of inspection rules.

The company, based in Chino, California, voluntarily recalled the beef after the federal Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) determined the cattle "did not receive complete and proper inspection."

The company did not "consistently contact the FSIS public health veterinarian in situations in which cattle became non-ambulatory" before being slaughtered, the USDA statement said on Sunday.

Federal rules usually ban the slaughter of "downer cattle" - those unable to walk - as a safeguard against mad cow disease or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

US Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer said Hallmark/Westland had been suspended by the FSIS, and that the federal government had suspended food and nutrition contracts with the company.

"I am dismayed by the inhumane handling of cattle that resulted in the violation of food safety regulations" by the company, Schafer said in a statement.

"It is extremely unlikely that these animals were at risk for BSE because of the multiple safeguards; however this action is necessary because plant procedures violated USDA regulations," he added.

The department did not say where those food products had been sold, but schools in Washington state and California removed beef from their lunch menus as a precaution, local officials said.

America's meat packing industry has already been plagued by outbreaks of E. coli bacteria and other problems.

In September, Topps Meats Co. of New Jersey recalled 21.7 million pounds of frozen hamburger patties after people in New York and Florida fell ill because of E. coli poisoning.

The New Jersey company later filed for bankruptcy because the recall involved a full year's worth of production.

The largest previous recall involved 35 million pounds of ready-to-eat meats in 1999.

James Reagan, Chairman of the Beef Industry Food Safety Council, backed Sunday's recall, describing it as "a precautionary measure," but sought to reassure consumers that the US beef supply is safe.

"We have multiple interlocking safeguards in place in every beef processing plant in America so that if one is bypassed, the other systems continue to ensure the product we serve our families remains safe," Reagan said.

But William Marler, a food safety attorney from Seattle, Washington, called for congressional hearings on the safety of the US beef supply, accusing the Department of Agriculture of failing to enforce its own ban against use of downer cattle in the nation's school lunch program.

"In light of the Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Company, which was caught on film processing 'downer' cattle, in violation of US law, we now know that USDA ban was a lie," Marler said. - AFP/de

Largest-ever beef recall
65 million kg recalled in US following cow abuse scandal
Today Online 19 Feb 08;

WASHINGTON — A meat company based in California has issued the largest beef recall in United States' history, 143 million pounds (64.9 million kilograms) — 37 million pounds of which was used to make hamburgers, chilli and tacos for a national school lunch programme, Department of Agriculture officials announced.

The Westland/Hallmark Meat Company's recall of all its raw and frozen beef products since Feb 1, 2006, comes after a widening animal-abuse scandal that started after the Humane Society of the United States distributed an undercover video on Jan 30. The video — which showed workers kicking sick cows and using forklifts to force them to walk — raised questions about the safety of the meat, because cows that cannot walk, called downer cows, pose an added risk of diseases including mad cow disease.

The video was embarrassing for the Department of Agriculture, as inspectors are supposed to be monitoring slaughterhouses for abuse. It surfaced after a year of increasing concerns about the safety of the meat supply amid a sharp increase in the number of recalls tied to a particularly deadly form of the E. coli pathogen.

There were 21 recalls of beef related to the potentially deadly strain of E. coli last year, compared with eight in 2006 and five in 2005.

The recall on Sunday was more than four times bigger than the previous record, the 1999 recall of 35 million pounds of ground beef by Thorn Apple Valley, federal officials said. It was prompted by a Department of Agriculture investigation that found that Westland/Hallmark did not always alert federal veterinarians when its cows became unable to walk after passing inspection, as required.

"Because the cattle did not receive complete and proper inspection, FSIS [the Agriculture Department's Food Safety and Inspection Service] has determined them to be unfit for human food and the company is conducting a recall," Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer said in a statement.

The announcement on Sunday was classified as a Class II recall, indicating that the chances of health hazards were remote.

Agriculture officials also said there was little health risk from the recalled meat because the animals had already passed pre-slaughter inspection and much of the meat had already been eaten. — the new york times news service


US to recall 65 million kg of beef from sick cows
Straits Times 19 Feb 08;

Abattoir has been slaughtering such cows for two years; USDA fears most of the meat has already been eaten
LOS ANGELES - THE US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has announced the country's largest beef recall to destroy 65 million kg produced by a California plant which slaughtered cows that were too ill to walk.

However, the USDA said the vast majority of the meat - including 17 million kg that went mostly to schools - had probably already been eaten.

Cattle weakened by disease are not supposed to enter the food supply because of the possibility they could suffer from bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), better known as mad cow disease, although officials said the danger to consumers in this case is minimal.

The recall applies to beef slaughtered at the Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Co in Chino, California, since Feb 1, 2006. The company has produced no meat since Feb 2 this year, when operations were suspended.

The action came nearly three weeks after the Humane Society of the United States released a video showing workers at the plant using forklifts and water hoses to rouse cattle too weak to walk to slaughter.

'Downer' cattle are not supposed to be used as meat unless a veterinarian determines that an animal stumbled or fell because of injury - a broken leg, for instance - that would not affect the safety of their meat.

But Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer said his department has evidence that Westland did not call in veterinarians.

Mr Steve Mendell, president of Hallmark Meat Packing, and its distributor, Westland, declined to comment.

Some supermarkets immediately began removing Hallmark meat from their freezer shelves, but because the company suspended operations two weeks ago, it is unlikely that any of its fresh meat is still being sold.

Meanwhile, the amount of beef affected by the recall may be far larger than the 65 million kg from Hallmark because meat from different companies is often mixed as it goes through numerous processors.

At a USDA telephone briefing for retailers, school districts and food safety experts on Sunday, concerns were raised about beef that gets 'commingled', according to Humane Society president Wayne Pacelle, who was on the conference call.

He said a representative of the Costco warehouse club chain estimated that the total beef recalled may top 450 million kg.

USDA officials said the whole impact of the recall was difficult to estimate because beef from Hallmark was supplied through a 'huge pipeline', including numerous processors and distributors.

As an example, Mr Bill Sessions of the Agricultural Marketing Service told reporters: 'Coarse ground beef...goes into further processors, who make end items such as cooked hamburger patties, chili meat, taco meat, that type of thing, that then goes into a distributor, and then is distributed to a local school system.'

By that time, the food packaging is not likely to carry any indication of where the meat came from.

California Representative George Miller, who has been closely following the Hallmark case, on Sunday called for a congressional hearing into the USDA's inspection process.

He said that the 'severity of this issue for both our nation's schools and consumers' made it necessary for Congress to step in.

LOS ANGELES TIMES, ASSOCIATED PRESS