Posted on 08/30/2007 6:39:10 AM PDT by fanfan
Food agency studies request to lift ban designed to keep out diseases.
China, the nation that has been battling scandals over contaminated exports ranging from pet food to toys, wants to export chicken that was raised, processed and cooked in China, to Canada.
As it stands, Canada does not allow imports of any poultry from China.
Fresh poultry is banned because of concerns about avian flu and Newcastle disease -- the first because it can affect humans, and the latter because it could affect Canada's chickens. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has begun studying a Chinese request to re-examine Canada's blanket ban on poultry from China. The agency is inspecting slaughterhouses, processing plants and laboratories to monitor antibiotic, pesticide and metal residues in the meat. China is also looking to open a market for cooked chicken products in the U.S.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency, however, has begun studying a Chinese request to re-examine the blanket ban, but any changes would likely be limited to cooked and canned poultry clearly marked as a product of China, said Bill Anderson, the director of the agency's meat program.
The agency has completed a review of documents, and is inspecting Chinese slaughterhouses, processing plants and laboratories used to monitor antibiotic, pesticide and metal residues in the meat.
"We have had some initial visits. There are still some questions we need to answer," said Mr. Anderson.
The initial inspections would be followed up by periodic audits of production facilities.
There are no on-farm visits involved in the process, he said. It will likely be several months before the food inspection agency completes its review.
The news comes as consumers grow increasingly wary of products from China, and as Chinese officials are looking to open a market for cooked chicken products in the U.S., which has sparked outcry from groups ranging from elected officials to the United Poultry Growers Association.
Dr. David Waltner-Toews, a Guelph University veterinarian and author of the recently-published book The Chickens Fight Back, says he was disappointed to learn that Canada is considering lifting the ban.
"I'm always skeptical about these kinds of solutions to problems that don't even exist," he said. "The idea of bringing in even cheaper chicken strikes me as -- I hate to say it -- immoral."
Although cooking kills chicken viruses and bacteria, there are other types of residues that are not destroyed during the cooking process that are cause for concern, he said. Metals such as led and cadmium, pesticides and antibiotics will stay in chicken after it is cooked, he said.
However, he admitted that these are not major concerns.
"The truth is that chicken is generally low in these sorts of things because there's not a lot of fat, and these things are fat soluble," he said.
A secondary issue is the fact that Chinese chicken might eventually be used as an ingredient in processed food such as frozen dinners -- but the country of origin need never be revealed.
While food products contain lists of calories and fat, there is no requirement to indicate the country of origin of each of the ingredients. A frozen dinner may incorporate, among other ingredients, potatoes from Prince Edward Island, chicken from Canada and spices from India. If the dinners are processed in Canada, the labelling would indicate that the dinner as a whole is a product of Canada -- it would be too complicated to indicate the origins of every component in the dinner.
"There's a huge amount of effort given to tracking cattle because of BSE. The same thing should apply to any animal," said Dr. Waltner-Toews.
"If they want to import it from Guatemala or China, then they should tells us that. From a public health point of view, I think that's bad," he said.
Deborah Whale, owner of Clovermeade Farms near Guelph and a past chairwoman of the Poultry Industry Council, said she has a lot of faith in the CFIA.
In Canada, almost all chicken purchased in supermarkets and restaurants is Canadian-raised and processed.
The industry here is supply-managed -- only 7.5 per cent of total production is permitted into Canada, and those sources include the U.S., Brazil and Thailand, she said.
The U.S. poultry market, which is not supply-managed, is a much richer prize.
There, in response to a request from China, the U.S. Food Safety and Inspection Service began the long process to determine whether China is "equivalent" to the U.S. in terms of chicken production and processing.
The service concluded that China was equivalent in terms of processing, but that their slaughter plants were not. As a result, the Chinese have been approved to import poultry that has been raised and slaughtered in the U.S., process it and export it back to the U.S. But that's only theoretical at this time.
Ultimately, the goal for the Chinese is to export processed chicken that was raised in China to the U.S., said Steven Cohen, a spokesman for the service. But that is a long way off, he predicts.
"Bottom line, there is a long road between the desire to export and the ability to export," he said.
The Chinese also technically have the right to import and process Canadian chicken for re-export. But in practical terms, that has never happened, and the approval has lapsed, said Mr. Anderson.
I see no need to import chicken or any other food from China. Well....maybe political deals made by Clinton and Gore.
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