Day 285 - 23 Oct 96 - Page 33


     
     1        So I think the words were there is some discrepancy as to
     2        what constitutes US beef, something like that.
     3
     4        And as far as we can see, the FSIS notice that -- if you
     5        remember the memo regarding what the law was as far as the
     6        FSIS is concerned....  I mean, I am not doing this
     7        properly.  I should be getting all these documents out.
     8        But the memo states, we submit, that it would be illegal
     9        to characterise or categorise a finished product as
    10        anything other than US beef unless a food company could
    11        satisfy the FSIS that it was one hundred percent emanating
    12        from another country which they could identify and show it
    13        was from that country.
    14
    15        Consequently, there is a great gaping hole in this
    16        labelling system, because, as we have all heard, beef,
    17        once it is checked, having arrived in the country from
    18        abroad, is re-labelled US beef or domestic product.  Dr.
    19        Gonzalez recognised on day 68, page 15, line 1, that --
    20        well, he said "may", a farm may not have an establishment
    21        number.  I think the situation is established that process
    22        plants and slaughter houses have a number assigned to
    23        their product.  I don't know since when.  Dr. Gonzalez
    24        anyway only knows from a certain time.
    25
    26        But the point being that beef from abroad that ends up in
    27        a process plant or at a process plant connected to a
    28        slaughter house or storage plant connected to a slaughter
    29        house, will presumably adopt the number from that place
    30        and appear to be sourced from there.
    31
    32        We have found the reference for the letter from Otto and
    33        Sons, which is a division of OSI industries, one of their
    34        major suppliers, one of McDonald's major suppliers in the
    35        USA, and it is volume 15, yellow, tab 85 subsection 2.  It
    36        says:  November 10th 1989.  Our customer requires that the
    37        beef we supply them originate from domestic sources.
    38        There appears to be some discrepancy under the USDA
    39        international programmes department import division as to
    40        what constitutes domestic beef.  In an effort to clarify
    41        this situation, we need assurance from you, our supplier,
    42        that all boneless beef offered to Otto and Sons be derived
    43        from beef cuts sourced within the continental boundaries
    44        of the United States.  Therefore as a continuing supplier,
    45        please have an officer of your company sign the following
    46        statement and return it to me as soon as possible.
    47
    48        And the statement read:  As a beef supplier to Otto and
    49        Sons we guarantee that all boneless beef offered to you
    50        will be from beef animals slaughtered within the
    51        continental boundaries of the United States.
    52 
    53        Not surprisingly, that was exactly what they got back.  We
    54        do not know, of course, there is nothing to say that every
    55        supplier returned that statement.  We do not know if every
    56        supplier was written to, whether some suppliers said that
    57        we could not guarantee this, therefore they were
    58        discontinued or whatever.  We do not know in the replies
    59        indeed how the person replying knew that fact, verified
    60        it, whether it had always been true.  It is all in the

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