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Legislature votes to
allow ractopamine
BEEF IMPORT ISSUE: The vote was split along
party lines, with KMT legislators voting for the amendment, while DPP, PFP and
TSU lawmakers voted against it
By Chris Wang, Shih Hsiu-chuan and Mo Yan-chih / Staff reporters
Opposition lawmakers hold
placards protesting against the import of beef containing ractopamine behind
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng, third right, at the legislature in Taipei
yesterday.
Photo: Mandy Cheng, AFP
The longstanding dispute over the
livestock feed additive ractopamine seemed to have been resolved yesterday as
amendments to related laws cleared the legislature, paving the way for the
partial lifting of restrictions on imports of beef containing residues of the
drug.
With a 63-46 vote along party lines, the nation is expected to adopt maximum
residue levels (MRL) of 10 parts per million (ppm) for ractopamine, a standard
favored by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).
The passage of the amendments to the Act Governing Food Sanitation (食品衛生管理法)
means that beef containing ractopamine residues would no longer be banned, a
policy that Ma claims has impeded bilateral trade negotiations and relations
between Taiwan and the US.
The amendment authorizes government agencies to establish safety standards for
ractopamine used as a cattle feed additive, but bans its use on pigs.
The Department of Health is to be in charge of finalizing the safety standards
for ractopamine, Executive Yuan spokesperson Hu Yu-wei (胡幼偉) said.
Hu said the department would take the MRL of 10ppm, recommended by the Codex
Alimentarius Commission as a reference point.
Forty Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators and three each from the
People First Party (PFP) and the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) voted against the
amendment.
The DPP and PFP favored a standard stricter than 10ppm, while the TSU insisted
on a zero-tolerance policy.
The four principles that Ma pledged would safeguard public health were not
written into law, DPP Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃) said.
The four principles are establishing a safe level of ractopamine residue for
beef imports; differentiating safety standards for beef and pork products;
requiring mandatory labeling of beef products; and maintaining the ban on
imports of beef offal from the US.
Instead, she said, the principles of differentiating pork and beef safety
standards and mandatory labeling were included in an additional resolution,
which would be ineffective because it was not legally binding.
DPP Legislator Pan Men-an (潘孟安) said Ma and the KMT ignored public doubts, in
particular those of pig farmers, about the government’s ability to implement the
measures, especially differentiating the standards for pork and beef products.
The DPP’s proposal, which called for the adoption of stricter standards than
those the commission had approved, was reasonable and made sense, but the KMT
blocked the initiative, DPP Legislator Lee Ying-yuan (李應元) said.
The TSU, which had said it did not rule out occupying the podium in the
legislature to block the proceedings in order to maintain the zero-tolerance
policy, did not disrupt the plenary session yesterday.
With the vote behind it, Ma said the government would seek to resume the Trade
and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA) talks with the US, which have been
stalled since 2007, immediately and speed up regional economic integration.
“Resolving the US beef import issue demonstrates our willingness to be part of
regional economic integration. Our next step is to resume talks on the TIFA with
the US. We cannot afford to wait any longer,” Presidential Office spokesman Fan
Chiang Tai-chi (范姜泰基) said of Ma’s response to the vote.
Ma has linked the US beef issue with the nation’s economic and trade relations
with the US and other countries, and argued that resuming TIFA talks and joining
the Trans-Pacific Partnership would prevent Taiwan from being marginalized in
regional economic integration.
The resumption of the TIFA talks would prepare the terrain for negotiations on
free-trade agreements (FTA) or other economic pacts with the nation’s major
trading partners, Ma said.
Ma said the government would establish a food labeling system that allows
consumers to identify US beef products and to make their own choice, while
excluding the import of US beef organ parts.
The government would impose a ban on US beef products immediately if any
scientific evidence proved that ractopamine is harmful to human health, he said.
Ma thanked Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) and KMT legislators for
helping to pass the bill.
“The approval of the bill is a great achievement of the close cooperation of the
legislative and executive branches under the KMT’s party-state mechanism,” he
said.
Meanwhile, retiring American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Director William Stanton
said the result was “personally gratifying to me” because he has “dedicated a
great deal of effort to see that the Taiwan[ese] market is open to US beef”
during his three-year tenure.
“I cannot think of a better conclusion to my tour as director than to have this
issue resolved in a positive way,” said Stanton, who is taking a teaching job at
the Taipei American School after he retires from a 34-year diplomatic career
next month.
Stanton said he “look[ed] forward to enjoying delicious US beef dinners with my
many Taiwan[ese] friends in the excellent restaurants here in Taiwan.”
“Today is a good day for Taiwan[ese] consumers, the Taiwan[ese] democratic
process, free trade and for US-Taiwan relations,” Stanton said as he thanked the
Ma administration, the legislature, academics, businesspeople and the media, who
he said “fought to have this issue decided on the basis of international,
science-based standards.”
The AIT also issued a short a statement.
“The US welcomes the vote and looks forward to the quick implementation of the
maximum residue level for ractopamine and the resumption of expanded access for
US beef in the Taiwan[ese] market,” the AIT statement said. “We also look
forward to resuming efforts to expand our vital bilateral trade and investment
ties that benefit us both.”
AIT spokesperson Sheila Paskman said the institute could not answer how
yesterday’s vote would impact on the resumption of the TIFA talks.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Steve Hsia (夏季昌) said the ministry
hopes the talks would resume by the end of this year or early next year.
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