Agricultural News
Efforts to Resolve Saudi Arabia Beef Impasse Continue
Wed, 18 Sep 2013 14:19:07 CDT
Saudi Arabia's suspension of U.S. beef imports has now lingered for nearly a year and a half, and continues to have a significant impact on the bottom line of U.S exporters who served this market. The suspension came about one month after an atypical BSE case was detected in California in April 2012.
As U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) Senior Vice President for Trade Access Thad Lively explains, this BSE case had no impact on the United States' BSE risk classification, which was controlled risk at the time but has since been upgraded to negligible risk. Very few trading partners reacted negatively to the case, but Saudi Arabia has been the notable exception.
Because Saudi Arabia represented less than 1 percent of the U.S. beef industry's total exports, closure of this market has attracted far less media attention than some other beef trade disputes. But this industry-wide percentage greatly understates the harsh impact this closure has had on several small and middle-sized U.S. companies that cultivated a significant customer base in Saudi Arabia and are now forced to watch from the sidelines as their customers turn to other suppliers.
Lively goes on to explain that USMEF is working closely with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Office of U.S. Trade Representative to reopen Saudi Arabia to U.S. beef, and he hopes to see progress in coming weeks.
Thad Livesly is our guest on the Beef Buzz- explaining the need for a conceerted "government to government" effort to reopen this market for US Beef.
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Network- but is also a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR below for today's show- and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
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