The following articles are
reproduced from Japan newspaper websites:
Firm searched in
beef-label scandal
The Japan
Times: Feb. 17, 2002
(C) All rights reserved
TAKAMATSU, Kagawa Pref. (Kyodo) The Ministry of Agriculture,
Forestry and Fisheries on Saturday inspected the head office of
meat sales company Kawai in Takamatsu, Kagawa Prefecture, in
connection with a beef-labelling scandal.
Officials
from the farm ministry's Chugoku-Shikoku Regional Agricultural
Administration Office said their inspection of the company for its
alleged use of imported U.S. beef in assorted beef packages
labelled as Japanese beef was conducted in line with the Japanese
agricultural standards law.
The Kagawa
Prefectural Government said it is to open a full-scale
investigation into the scandal based on material gathered from
Friday's inspection of Kawai facilities in the town of Kokubunji,
Kagawa and other locations, as well as documents related to beef
sales.
The
prefectural government said it is also considering inspecting a
number of locations again, including Kawai's head office.
Prefectural
government officials have said they discovered Kawai had falsely
labelled beef products after the agricultural administration
office in western Japan notified them in July about suspicions
concerning the meat.
The latest
meat-fraud case follows the revelation last month that Snow Brand
Foods Co. repackaged Australian beef as domestic beef to claim
subsidies in a government buyback scheme connected to mad cow
disease. The scandal has rocked public confidence in Japan's food
producers.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20020217q4.htm
Meat packer
denies mislabeling pork products
The Japan
Times: March 1, 2002
(C) All rights reserved
SAGA (Kyodo) The head of a local packaging facility for Starzen
Co., a major dealer in domestic and imported meat, denied
allegations Thursday that he ordered the mislabelling of the
company's pork products.
"I did not
know about the forgery," Kazuhiro Imaizumi said at a press
conference. "I think it is being blamed on me because some workers
said they did it on orders from the centre chief during
inspections by the farm ministry conducted from the 24th to the
26th (of February)."
Imaizumi's
comments contradict Starzen officials who said the company sold
pork from inexpensive white pigs as that of black pigs, and that
Imaizumi gave the orders to mislabel it.
Imaizumi said
the packaging facility would look into the mislabelling
allegations closely, adding that there have also been cases in
which incorrect labels were used by mistake.
Starzen
Managing Director Ritsu Akiyama said at a press conference
Wednesday that the head office never issued instructions for the
mislabelling. Akiyama said the head office believes the order came
from the chief of the packing centre.
Starzen said
Wednesday it sold pathogen-free pork from white pigs as pork from
black pigs from June 2000 to around December 2001.
The company
said it is also investigating another allegation that it may have
sold, from around July 2000 to October 2001, Holstein meat as
high-quality beef from cattle raised in Saga.
The pork and
beef products in question were sold at 16 supermarket stores in
Kyushu after being mislabelled at the firm's Saga facility, it
said.
The
mislabelling case was detected in farm ministry inspections
conducted after a series of meat-linked scandals broke out
involving Snow Brand Foods Co.
Prime
Minister Junichiro Koizumi expressed regret over the case.
"The case is
unfortunate, as it damages consumers' trust," Koizumi said at his
official residence. "The farm ministry needs to investigate the
allegation."
The farm
ministry's branch in Kyushu conducted an on-the-spot inspection at
the Saga facility Thursday.
Kyushu-Jusco
Co., which operates supermarkets in the Kyushu area, said Thursday
it has withdrawn Starzen products from its stores and suspended
purchases from the meat dealer.
A total of 16
of its outlets in the Kyushu area were affected because they
purchased their meat exclusively from Starzen, the company said.
Starzen,
based in Tokyo, is listed on the first section of the Tokyo Stock
Exchange.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20020301b1.htm
Snow Brand may
link up with rivals
The Japan
Times: March 3, 2002
(C) All rights reserved
Snow Brand Milk Products Co., the parent company of scandal-hit
Snow Brand Foods Co., is considering spinning off its milk
products division and merging it with those of the National
Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Associations (Zen-Noh) and
two other entities, sources close to the talks said Saturday.
The two other
parties with close ties to thousands of Japanese farm co-ops are
the National Federation of Dairy Co-cooperative Associations (Zenrakuren)
and Kyodo Milk Industry Co., a major maker of dairy products known
for its Meito brand, the sources said.
Snow Brand
Milk, Zen-Noh, Zenrakuren and Kyodo Milk Industry are considering
three integration scenarios.
The first is
based on a proposal to merge their milk products sections and
place the resultant entity under a holding company, the sources
said.
The parties
are also contemplating merging their respective milk products
divisions to make them into a new, independent company without a
holding company structure, they added.
The third
proposal calls for Snow Brand Milk and Zen-Noh to purchase the
milk products divisions of Zenrakuren and Kyodo Milk Industry with
an eye to integrating the milk products divisions of the four
parties into a new company, they said.
Snow Brand
Milk is trying to revive its business after the double shock of a
string of scandals involving itself and Snow Brand Foods, which
will soon be disbanded due to its inability to rehabilitate itself
in the wake of a plunge in sales induced by a beef mislabeling
scandal.
Snow Brand
Milk took the initial blow from a food-poisoning outbreak in the
summer of 2000.
The poisoning
incident made some 15,000 people sick after they consumed tainted
Snow Brand Milk products, which the company was forced to recall.
Snow Brand
Milk later acknowledged that its dairy products were tainted with
a toxin produced by staphylococcus aureus bacteria. Sales at Snow
Brand Milk have slumped since the scandal.
Industry
sources said Snow Brand Milk, which has a large processed-food
division, wants to facilitate talks with other companies on
concluding a capital tieup agreement by spinning off the milk
products division.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20020303a9.htm
C•
Boat shipment in March results
in significant savings over air shipment.
Previously, calves left
Westholme at 8.00am on the day of shipment and arrived in Japan
quarantine 24 hours later. This resulted in minimum stress
for calves and body weight reductions of approx 5% which was
quickly recovered.
Boat shipment obviously takes
longer and depending on the weather conditions, can result in
stress and body weight loss of up to 40kg per head. To
overcome this, Westholme has adjusted its feed formula through the
3 feeding stages before pre-embarkation quarantine (PEQ).
These include:
