An expected court challenge to stop the resumption of imports of older Canadian cattle into the United States has been filed.
R-CALF, along with 10 allies including individuals and organizations, filed against Rule 2 in a South Dakota district court Oct. 24. The complaint said the regulation would put U.S. cattle and consumers at risk if Canadian cattle older than 30 months or their beef were allowed to enter the country. The border is scheduled to open for older animals Nov. 19.
A court day has not yet been granted.
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The complaint charges that Canada has a high BSE risk and says inadequate procedures exist in the U.S. that could not effectively stop the disease from spreading among American cattle. It also says consumers would risk contracting variant Creutzfeld Jakob disease.
“USDA (the U.S. Department of Agriculture) wants to normalize trade with Canada when things aren’t normal in Canada,” said Chris Waldrop of the Consumers Federation of America, which represents about 300 consumer advocacy groups.
“The firewalls in the United States are not nearly strong enough,” he said at a press conference in Washington Nov. 1.
There is a U.S. ban on specified risk materials believed to harbour the disease but he charges their removal is not done adequately at the plant level. The Food and Drug Administration lacks resources for full inspection of plants and there is not enough BSE testing of American animals, he said.
The U.S. 1997 feed ban has loopholes because it still allows meat and bone meal derived from SRMs to be fed to poultry and pigs and it allows processed manure from chickens to be fed to cattle. Canada has a ban on using any of these materials for any purpose, but it has not been in place long enough to be effective, Waldrop said.
Further, there is no mandatory identification program in the U.S. that would allow the government to trace Canadian animals once they arrive.
R-CALF has always argued Canada has a higher level of disease with 11 cases in native born animals including five born after the 1997 feed ban.
“Canada’s risk profile for BSE is significantly different than that of the United States,” said Bill Bullard, chief executive officer of R-CALF.
Canada found its first case in an imported cow in 1993 but did not implement risk management rules until 1997 whereas the U.S. did not find a case until 2003 when its feed ban had been in place for four years.
Besides this case, R-CALF’s last chance to appeal a decision allowing imports of cattle younger than 30 months is due Nov. 26 before the Supreme Court. The highest court is not likely to hear the case, said John Masswohl of the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association.
He said the newest injunction was expected and it will cost Canadian producers in legal expenses and lost sales if the border opening is delayed.
“We are going to have to go through more legal hoops on that and more legal expenses. But we were expecting that to happen.”
Masswohl also believes R-CALF made a tactical error in waiting to file a complaint 42 days after the rule was published. The first case against Rule 1 was filed a week after the rule was published.
“On Rule 1, R-CALF argued they needed an emergency injunction because implementing the rule would cause irreparable damage to the U.S. industry,” he said.
“It is going to be somewhat difficult for them to argue to a judge they need an emergency injunction and the court will come back and say ‘why did you wait till Day 42?’ “
USDA’s Rule 2 would allow breeding animals and purebred stock to cross the border, something Canadian dairy and beef producers have been anticipating for 41/2 years, said Rick McRonald, head of the Canadian Livestock Genetics Association. The injunction request came as no surprise.
“We have been waiting and watching and now we know,” he said.
“The complaint is more subdued but it still twists facts and flies in the face of the international rules stated by the (World Animal Health Agency),” McRonald said.
