Day 241 - 26 Apr 96 - Page 37
1
2 "Thus, in my 1980 report, I was able to determine, based on
3 interviews, which companies admitted that they used some
4 beef imported from tropical Latin American nations in their
5 products. Among those verifying such use in 1979-80 were
6 Burger King and Jack-in-the-Box. (A few years later, when
7 concerned citizens and groups effected boycotts of these
8 two companies, the companies first issued denials and
9 threatened legal action, but when faced with the sources of
10 the information, which came from within each company, said
11 they would discontinue using beef imported from Latin
12 America.)
13
14 "Some companies said that they used imported beef, but were
15 unable to be specific about the countries of origin.
16 (Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the European Economic
17 Community are among those countries exporting beef to the
18 US.) For those US-based companies stating that they use no
19 imported beef whatsoever, I interviewed, whenever,
20 possible, US government meat inspectors that were stationed
21 in meat manufacturing plants that supplied the companies in
22 question.
23
24 "A problem arises with the question of whether a company is
25 using imported beef because under US law, once imported
26 beef is cleared by the authorities, it loses its imported
27 identity and gains the status of US graded beef. Thus, if
28 the meat is purchased by a broker for resale, the next or
29 final buyer only knows the US grade of the product and not
30 necessarily the country of origin. (Manufacturers directly
31 purchasing meat from abroad, of course, are aware of the
32 country of origin.) Efforts by some US environmentalists
33 to have Congress enact a labelling law designating a beef's
34 country of origin have been unsuccessful to date.
35
36 "In the case of McDonald's Corporation, the Company has
37 long maintained that their US franchises do not use any
38 imported beef. (McDonald's has said that their franchises
39 operating in tropical Latin American countries, such as
40 Guatemala and Panama, do use beef from the countries in
41 which they are located.) A spokesperson for McDonald's
42 National Purchasing and Quality Assurance Department,
43 responding to the suggestion that the Company may
44 unknowingly be using some imported beef, said: 'McDonald's
45 Corporation itself does not buy or sell any of the products
46 used in McDonald's franchises'.
47
48 "An officers of the Equity Meat Corporation, which in the
49 early 1980s supplied almost half of McDonald's beef in the
50 US, responded to the question of whether some imported meat
51 may be used unwittingly in McDonald's hamburgers by saying,
52 'It would be difficult for imported beef mixed with US
53 trimmings to be sold to a cautious manufacturer like
54 Equity'.
55
56 "A US Department of Agriculture meat inspector who was
57 stationed at Equity's facility near Philadelphia,
58 Pennsylvania, in the late 1970s, told me that imported beef
59 from Australia and New Zealand - 'not much from elsewhere'
60 - was used in the preparation of ground beef for
