Lift ban on import of live animals, requests US official

Pakistan placed sanction due to risk of ‘mad cow disease’.

ISLAMABAD:

William J Burns, deputy secretary of the US, has requested Pakistan to lift the ban on import of live animals from the US. Islamabad had imposed the ban due to a risk of the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) — commonly referred to as the mad cow disease.

The visiting US official made the request during a meeting with Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.

“The deputy secretary of state expressed hope that the import of live animals from the US will be allowed by the government,” according to an official handout issued by the finance ministry after the meeting.

Dar assured Burns that the Economic Coordination Committee of the Cabinet will take an appropriate decision, it added.

The Ministry of National Food Security has already moved a summary to the ECC, seeking permission to lift the ban on import of live animals from the US.

According to officials, the permission would be granted on the condition that animals from herds with no incidence of BSE in the last 11 years would be imported. This fact should also be certified by the authority concerned of the exporting country.

It is difficult to detect the disease in live animals because no test is currently available in Pakistan. The post-slaughter diagnosis is done through medical examination of brain tissues and other vulnerable body parts like spinal cord, according to media reports, based on the Ministry of Food summary.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 10^th, 2014.

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