Brazil-Beef for Indonesia.
BRAZIL-CLEANING UP THE BEEF REPUTATION.
Brazil has long since shaken off foot and mouth disease in its cattle herd and is ready to supply more affordable beef and meat products to Indonesia, a Brazilian official said Tuesday.
Indonesia , which gets most of its imported beef from Australia and New Zealand at a higher cost, limits Brazilian beef to one small state certified free from the disease without vaccination. However, the state, Santa Catarina doesn’t have adequate beef supplies to export, said Eduardo Sampaio Marques, an official with the livestock and food supply unit of the Brazilian Agriculture Ministry.
"Santa Catarina has only a small supply of beef," Marques said. "We still have many other states that are sources of beef.
Brazil , by far the world’s biggest supplier of beef with about 180 million cattle, has periodically been hit with the highly infectious disease, most recently in 2004. However, Thomas Kim, the executive director of the Brazilian Beef Industries Association, said no outbreaks have occurred over the past three years in the nine states that had been previously hit by outbreaks.
"We can say that the beef is safe to be consumed," Kim said. He also emphasized its halal status, saying Brazil also exports beef to many Muslim countries, such as Malaysia , Iran , Iraq and Egypt .
Brazilian beef, he said, would cost about $3 per kilogram compared with domestic prices of $4 to $5 per kg.
Adi Sasono, chairman of the Indonesian Cooperatives’ Council (Dekopin), said Indonesia has long been too dependent on Australia and New Zealand for its beef. "If we can find another source that has beef products as healthy and as halal as these two countries, why not?" Adi said in a news conference. Imports from New Zealand and Australia have increased from 20 percent of total demand to 35 percent in 2008, with the rest principally from domestic sources.
Adi said he hoped that falling domestic prices would increase meat and beef consumption. Indonesians consume only about 1.7 kg of meat per capita per year, compared with Brazilians, who eat 80 kg annually.
