RI denies buying UK animal feed

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Feedmillers Association, seeking to dampen new fears that Indonesia could be hit by mad cow disease due to the use of tainted feed, said Indonesia had never imported cattle feed or raw materials for cattle feed from countries with recorded mad cow disease, including Britain.

"We rarely or almost never import feed products or raw material for feed from European countries, including Britain.

"There might be some feed imports from Britain, but I think they are all used for pets, nothing for cattle. I suggest you check with pet feed sellers here," association secretary general Wahyudi Mohtar told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

Scientists in Britain earlier said Indonesia as well as Thailand, Taiwan and Sri Langka potentially could become victims of mad cow disease due to the use of tainted animal feed imported from Britain.

Mohtar said local traders or cattle farmers preferred buying locally produced feed, because it was cheaper and better in terms of freshness.

He said local feed producers buy corn from the United States and Argentina, soybean meal from the U.S. and India and bone and meat from New Zealand and Australia as raw materials to make animal feed.

He also said local feed producers always coordinated their import plans with the Directorate General of Animal Husbandry, which had the list of countries from which they are not allowed to import.

Britain, which banned the feeding of processed animal carcasses to cattle in 1986, reportedly exported much of its stocks of feed to Europe and beyond until a decade later when the trade was stopped.

Britain's customs data shows that Indonesia started importing general feedstuffs from Britain in 1991, with the largest consignment of over 20,060 tons in 1993, compared with less than six tons into Germany that year.

Germany is now one of the countries which has been hit by mad cow disease.

Mad cow disease or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is a brain-wasting disease that has afflicted thousands of cattle in Europe and can be transmitted to humans who eat the diseased animals. The human form of BSE, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, has killed more than 80 people in Britain and two in France since 1996.

The ministry of agriculture has sparked controversy by allowing the importation of beef from the Republic of Ireland starting last month despite moves by many countries to ban beef imports from Europe.

But, Budi Tri Akoso, director of the health department at the ministry, maintained that beef imports from Ireland were free from mad cow disease.

He said prior to the issuance of the decree allowing the importation of beef from the Ireland, the ministry had sent a team to ensure that the beef was free from mad cow disease.

In order to reduce the risk, the government would only allow the import of "deboned meat", which do not include brains, nerves or lymphatic tissues, Budi said.

He said in 1996, the ministry banned all imports of beef and some derivative products, including medicine and cosmetics, from countries in Western Europe with recorded mad cow disease.

Meanwhile, in Thailand, officials at the livestock department said on Thursday they saw no chance of so-called mad cow disease spreading to Thailand, adding Thailand had banned imports of animal feed from countries hit by the disease.

"No mad cow disease has been found in Thailand," Prachak Thiratinrat, a director at the livestock department's disease control division, was quoted by Reuters as saying.

In Japan, the Agriculture Ministry said an outbreak of mad cow disease is unlikely in Japan, as the country has taken sufficient preventive measures.

"We have taken preventive measures since 1990 and we have had no reports of the disease in Japan to date. It is quite unlikely that the disease will spread to Japan in the future," said an official at the ministry's Livestock Industry Bureau.

Japan imposed a partial ban on imports of beef and beef products from Britain in 1990 to prevent the spread of mad cow disease. A total ban was adopted in 1996.

Japan tightened its regulations further, banning imports of beef, processed beef and related cattle products from the European Union from January.

Meanwhile, the Australia New Zealand Food Authority said that Australia has extended its tests for any evidence of mad cow disease to dairy and other products as part of efforts to remain free of the disease.

The precautionary tests follow a ban from January 8 on beef products from more than two dozen countries in Europe because of an outbreak of mad cow disease.