Alternative BSE Risk Assessment Methodology of Imported Beef and Beef Offal to Japan

Abstract

Food Safety Commission (FSC) of Japan, established in July 2003, has its own initiative to conduct risk assessments on food stuffs known as 'self-tasking assessment'. Within this framework, FSC decided to conduct the risk assessment of beef and beef offal imported to Japan from countries with no previous BSE reports, thus a methodology was formed to suit to this purpose. This methodology was partly based on the previous assessments on Japanese domestic beef and beef imported from US/Canada, but some modification was added. Other organizations' assessment methods, such as those used for BSE status assessment in live cattle by OIE and EFSA's GBR, were also consulted. In this review, the authors introduce this alternative methodology that reflects (1) the risk of live cattle in the assessed country including temporal risks of BSE invasion and domestic propagation, with the assessment results verified by surveillance data, and (2) the risk of beef and beef offal consisting of cumulative BSE risk by types of slaughtering and meat production processes implemented, and the status of mechanically recovered meat production. Other possibly influencing factors such as atypical BSE cases were also reviewed. The key characteristic of the current assessment is a combination of time sequential risk level of live cattle and qualitative risk level of meat productions at present in an assessed country.