Mad cow came about by farmers feeding sick cattle to...cows as processed food.
No current out break is active in any country.
No meat from any country with live infection can ever come to Australia.
The practice that bought this illness into being has stopped.
No person to person transmission is taking place now, blood transfusions may have been the only way/
Australian farmers, I have owned cattle, burn and hide sick cattle ,many times I have heard of and seen farmers who thought their heard had black leg fever burn dead ones and say nothing.
If we import blue tongue via NT some will hide it not report it until it spreads far more than it should.
Those killing export houses please, they opened to export for profit.
While our dollar was low.
They closed because the dollar rose.
Noway farmers claim other than fear of illness never competition for banning this meat.
half of one percent is nothing.
not one hamburger filler will come before next year at the earliest.
We may be banned from exporting ourselves by then, only time separate us from our infection day, it however will not be mad cow.

Belly is correct,

No meat is imported from a country with any infections within the last year. And none of the meat is from cattle that could have been exposed (never fed bone meal), and none of the meat contains nerve tissue in which the disease is transmitted.

The risk of BSE in the imported meat is infinitesimal. The histrionics over eating pies is not supported by logic.

rexw; As belly says, you really need to get your facts right before you go off quoting stuff like that. Freight and handling costs alone would be around 50c kilo, or more.

Foxy; Apparently beef prices are at their lowest
since the 1974-78 cattle depression.

Not true, mid 1990's jap ox steers bottomed out at 49c kilo in Victoria. That was the low point.

Three abattoirs have closed in recent weeks,
with the loss of 540 jobs.

Now if you are referring to the QLD abbs, these were domestic, not export. They closed due to lack of cattle (our overall heard is about 8 million short), which will take about 2 to 3 years to rebuild, and productions costs are to high.

>>>"Made in Australia."
This is a joke, made in AU from local and imported ingredients.

Cornflower; (eg snouts, ears, udders, lots of heart and blood and dollops of fat)

That is overstated. Any of these ingredients must be listed. As a butcher it is illegal for me to sell mince that contains ofals of any kind.

Also, another gey area in labelling is meat pies are usually only tested for 'meat content' and, only those labeled as 'meat pies'. Anything else, eg; mushroom, pie with peas, or even steak pie all slip under the radar as they are not considered as a 'meat pie' for some wierd reason.

The only regulation for a 'meat pie' is that it contains 28% meat and even that is a 'grey area' and one that is often confusing, even to the field officers who test pies.

Off track, but did you know that a baker makes approx 28 pies from one kilo of meat which he pays around $5.50 for, adds pastry at 7 cents per pie, then sells the lot for around $106.00. That's about a 1400% markup. And you think steak from the butcher or supermarket is expensive!

Continued
Belly; Mad cow came about by farmers feeding sick cattle to...cows as processed food.

I think you will find it was from 'meat meal' made from 'sheep products' rather than cattle. Meat meal was commonly used in stock food production, even here in AU.

You are right in saying that any outbreak will be hidden, as farmers are devistated on suspiscion of and outbreak and, they are not compensated to my knowledge. Perhaps a better approach would be to compensate those who come forward and penilise those who don't.

Dear rehctub,

You might be interested in taking a look
at the following website:

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/The-threat-to-Aussie-steak/

Its an article by Tracey Spicer, 23 Feb. 2010.

Scroll all the way down - her article is way down
the bottom of the page - but it's where I got my
info. from.

Not surprised Foxy; as honestly knew it all first hand.

Why waste all of our tax dollars implementing defence systems over the past 30 years with all of the 12-14 hour work days done by public servants [believe it or not in the old days where one never got paid for putting all the time and effort into 12-14 hour days] for government to allow importation placing us at risk.

Q: To Politicians [as opposed to public servants btw]: big difference.

How do you propose [after the Equine Influenza outbreak and costs] while our economy is in 300billion deficit; to compensate Australians regarding our health and our trade consequences AFTER you have given into the pressure of lifting the long term greatly opposed ban of UK BSE Beef products. What follows next: the flaming milk and dairy products? Come on. Where is your commonsense?

Remain strong Senator Heffernan and keep the pressure up until the greedy politicians see sense and realise that the importation of high risk products will set Australia behind another 30years.