Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) Martin Heydon has said that the Covid-19 pandemic seems to have delayed the reopening of the Chinese market to Irish beef.
In an in-depth interview with AgriLand editor Stella Meehan, the minister, who has responsibility for new market development, explained that Irish officials and diplomats are doing everything in their power to push for the resumption of beef exports to China.
Beef exports were temporarily suspended in May of this year, due to the discovery of atypical BSE in a cow in Co. Tipperary.
The comments come as Meat Industry Ireland (MII) has urged the government here “at the highest level” to intervene in a diplomatic effort to secure the reopening of the Chinese market for Irish beef.
Also Read: Government urged to intensify efforts to reopen Chinese market for beef“There [are] no health implications whatsoever in relation to an atypical case, it’s one of those things that’s accepted scientifically can happen from time to time and if anything I believe the Chinese can take great comfort from the fact that our systems identified it and they were notified,” Minister Heydon said.
“We are dealing through the GACC [General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China].
In simple terms, we have been supplying them with all the information they needed; all the follow-up tests to show that everything else is absolutely fine and we’re pushing very hard diplomatically as well as through our officials here to regain open access to the Chinese market.
“We’re very hopeful that we can get that market access back open very, very soon because it is a considerable length of time since May and there are no safety concerns about this,” the minister added.
In the video below, Minister Heydon tells AgriLand that the decision to reopen the market for Irish beef exports to China is solely within China’s control:
International diplomacy
The minister told AgriLand that the ball firmly remains in China’s court and any information sought by the Chinese has been immediately forthcoming from the Irish side.
“I met with the Chinese ambassador as well as my officials having very regular contact…as well as our diplomatic team; so we have our agricultural attaché in China, we have our diplomatic team there providing any information as it’s required; detailed surveys come in, questions we’re asked…anything that’s needed on an official level is also supplied back to them,” the minister said.
“I continue to push at a political level as well to try and get that access back up as quickly as possible. This is very much a matter for the Chinese and I accept that the committee and the officials that we would be dealing with are also dealing with a whole range of issues around Covid-19.
Our feedback is that [Covid-19] has probably been some of the delay on the paperwork side on their end but this is very much their decision.
“From a trade perspective, we’d always like things to happen quicker. From our perspective we’ve given every reassurance that we can as to the safety of Irish beef, the quality of it. There were some exciting markets opening up for us in China; Irish companies were really getting a foothold in there and we’re really keen to get back to that,” Minister Heydon added.
The minister said that he will continue to use his position to highlight the urgent and strong desire to get open access for Irish beef in China back up and running as soon as possible.