Beef-state senators warn of trade war with Japan

WASHINGTON – Farm-state senators frustrated with Japan over its ban on U.S. beef exports threatened a trade war Wednesday.

Along with leveling a barrage of rhetoric, the senators introduced a bill that would impose tariffs on Japanese imports unless the Asian nation lifts its nearly two-year-old ban on U.S. beef by the end of the year. Japan had slapped the ban on after a mad cow scare in 2003.

“I think we’re being played for a bunch of suckers,” said Sen. Jim Talent, a Missouri Republican. Sen. Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat, chose the word “chumps.”

Most of the senators supporting the bill are committed to free trade and said they hoped that the threat of sanctions would give U.S. trade negotiators leverage to force the Japanese government’s hand.

If the tariffs in the bill were imposed, prices for such popular Japanese imports as cars and electronics would rise, and the economic effects would be dire.

In an unusual show of unbridled anger, the rhetoric among the senators announcing the bill at a Capitol Hill news conference Wednesday was stripped of diplomatic niceties.

“It’s time to play hardball,” said Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican.

Sen. Ken Salazar, a Colorado Democrat and a rancher, offered the most piquant imagery, suggesting it was time to take an electronic cattle prod to a stubborn Japan.

Japan had been the biggest overseas market for U.S. beef, accounting for about one-third of foreign sales. But it banned U.S. beef in December 2003 after a cow in Washington state was discovered to have bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly called mad cow disease. That cow was later discovered to be from Canada.

After the 2003 incident, more than 60 nations banned U.S. beef. Many have reopened their borders. But Japan was by far the largest market for U.S. beef and remains the largest market closed to it.

The proposed bill would require the U.S. government to impose retaliatory tariffs on Japanese imports to the tune of $3 billion a year. That’s about the same amount the U.S. cattle industry says the Japanese ban is costing it.

Beef is the largest sector of the U.S. agriculture industry, and about 95 percent of the potential beef market is outside the United States.

“Japan has chosen to ignore internationally recognized science and instead based their food safety on emotion and politics,” said Sen. Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican and a chief sponsor of the bill. “This comes at a high price for the American beef industry. … We’re not going to stand idly by while politics and posturing drive international trade policy rather than sound science.”

A year ago, Japan pledged to reopen the market for beef, but nothing has happened despite prodding from trade negotiators, the State Department and even President Bush. The president is to visit Japan in mid-November, and he is expected to raise the issue again if the ban remains intact.

In a news release, the Japanese Embassy said it was disappointed by the bill and said the process for lifting the ban was moving forward.

“A threat of retaliation is not helpful in solving the problem based on science,” the release said.

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Wednesday that Japan was in no hurry to lift the ban, according to an Associated Press report from Tokyo. A poll cited in the report found that 70 percent of Japanese opposed lifting the ban.