Taiwan's beef about Ractopamine in pork

Monday, December 3, 2012

Taiwan agreed in July to set a maximum residue limit of 10 parts per billion (ppb) of growth promoter Ractopamine in imported beef cuts from the United States, and imports began in September. The limit for the same drug in pork is zero. What gives?

Economic policy analyst Ross Korves, in a recent column published in the Truth About Trade and Technology, wrote that "most of Taiwan's pork consumption comes from domestic production, but only a small amount of beef is produced locally. "

Use of Ractopamine, first approved for sale by Eli Lilly in the United States 10 years ago, remains controversial. In July, the Codex Alimentarius Commission in Rome set a 10 ppb limit following a very close (69-67) vote.  (The limit in the United States is 30 ppm.) The Codex was created by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization in 1963 to set food standards and codes of practice that contribute to the safety of food trade, according to Korves.

Taiwan is Canada's tenth largest export market, with sales worth $54.25 million in 2010, up 211 per cent from 2007, according to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. The United States sold about the same amount of pork there in 2010. BP