Ground beef found in shipment from U.S. in violation of trade accord

Saturday 09th August, 05:27 AM JST

The requested article has expired, and is no longer available. Any related articles, and user comments are shown below.

Latest 15 of 34 Total Comments Show All

cleo at 05:05 PM JST - 10th August

My point is 4.5 Kg could have have been put into the order by some idiot as a sick joke, not a mistake by the company

The company allows 'some idiot' direct access to shipments headed for export, to the end that said idiot can, undetected, slip into the shipment 4.5 kilos of something that is specifically not supposed to be there? Instead of 4.5 kilos of ground meat, it could just have easily have been 4.5 kilos of pesticide-laced gyoza, arsenic-seasoned steak or anthrax-dipped chuck. In other words the company did not have complete and sure security over its product. I'd call that definitely a mistake by the company.
TheNewZen at 05:11 PM JST - 10th August

adding the latest incident marks the third time that the facility has infringed the bilateral accord

Doesn't look like it was their first mistake either. NEITHER the company nor the US goverment seem to be too interested in sorting a repeating mistake.

I think the US goverment should take that company of the list of suppliers to Japan.
imagawa at 09:20 AM JST - 11th August

Cleo

I know that you are a veggy so might have forgotten by now what 4.5Kg of squashed animal looks like, it isn’t that much & we are talking about a meatpacking plant here, lots of dead animal of all kinds about the place. I really don’t think it would be that hard for somebody to do, & the target might not be Japan but the firm itself. Maybe somebody doesn’t like the people they work for, it happens.

It was also just a way of taking the issue a way from this war of words about Japan this & that, the same old same old we always get when it comes to beef.
cleo at 09:54 AM JST - 11th August

imagawa -

I know what 4.5 kilos of squashed animal looks like. I imagine people who work in a meat packing plant also have a pretty good idea of what it looks like. Yet it was allowed to be included in a shipment from which squashed animal was meant to be specifically excluded. Still looks to me like a mistake on the part of the company. Whatever the reason for it being put in there, a final check before the shipment was sealed for export should have spotted it.

It's thought that the poisoned gyoza was also down to someone who didn't like the people they worked for. Now everyone at that factory has been laid off.

it happens

That kind of shoulder shrug is what makes people wary about US beef as a whole. It's like you're saying, Yeah, well we promised to ship this stuff, but there's every chance you'll get that stuff instead. We can't be bothered to stick to our agreements.

the same old same old we always get when it comes to beef.

Easily solved, just give the customer what he asks for. If you're not prepared to supply what the customer wants, fine; but don't expect him to be grateful for whatever you deign to throw at him in violation of commercial agreements.
imagawa at 06:15 PM JST - 11th August

Cleo

“Easily solved, just give the customer what he asks for. If you're not prepared to supply what the customer wants, fine; but don't expect him to be grateful for whatever you deign to throw at him in violation of commercial agreements.”

You will see from my first post I was saying just this, but when it comes a genuine customer complaint, especially if the custom is Japanese, the Americans start talking trade war. It seems that to be critical of everything American, even with good reason, is simply not acceptable. But then this American idea that all things American are simply perfect & as such must defended no matter what almost invites attack. Strange they can’t realize that even paranoids can have real enimies & sometimes with real reasons for being such.

“That kind of shoulder shrug”

No shoulder shrug from me on this or any other food issue. What drives me crazy is the ease with which any damn chemical can be added to a food on the grounds that it is “not harmful”, true or not (& we don’t alaways get to find out until years latter) I am tired of companies being allowed to mess with our food so that they can increase their profits.

My original reasoning on this issue was that the product had nothing to do with it, this was a breach of contract, nine times. Now that really is an act of supreme arrogance.
cleo at 06:27 PM JST - 11th August

I am tired of companies being allowed to mess with our food so that they can increase their profits.

I second that.

the product had nothing to do with it, this was a breach of contract, nine times. Now that really is an act of supreme arrogance

Or supreme incompetence, of course. It's when the one breaching the contract comes back with 'the contract's wrong anyway' that the arrogance comes in.
motytrah at 02:42 AM JST - 14th August

Cargill isn't just a meat packer. They are one of the largest privately held companies in the world. You live in any part of the civilized world and you'll eat half a dozen products a day that contain raw materials that come from them.

I'm pretty sure that if Cargill imported ground beef it was because a Japanese customer asked them to. They have incredibility advanced logistics system. Ground beef doesn't just get put on the boat.

To that end, they have a lot of power globally. They own companies in Japan. They will have well respected surrogates apply pressure to the Japanese Gov't.
rtrhead1 at 03:13 PM JST - 19th August

"That kind of shoulder shrug is what makes people wary about US beef as a whole. It's like you're saying, Yeah, well we promised to ship this stuff, but there's every chance you'll get that stuff instead. We can't be bothered to stick to our agreements." - Cleo

Funny, this argument fits VERY well to the Japanese food/car/electronics/misc. companies also.
cleo at 04:59 PM JST - 19th August

Funny, this argument fits VERY well to the Japanese food/car/electronics/misc. companies also.

Fine, then call them out on it next time you order a HDD video recorder and instead get the betamax you specifically didn't order and in fact stated categorically you didn't want.
rtrhead1 at 11:11 AM JST - 20th August

Or, how about when a person orders a Mitsubishi with working brakes, but instead get one with non working display brakes knowing full well you ordered a working set with your truck. Try again. How about snow bird milk. The customer ordered milk that was within expiration dates. They got expired, relabeled milk. Wanna take another shot at it?
cleo at 11:30 AM JST - 20th August

And after the first recall, did Mitsubishi just shrug its shoulders and repeat its 'mistake' three times? And claim that it was the customer in the wrong for not accepting what it was managing to fob off on the domestic market?

Did Yukijirushi shrug its shoulders and say, 'Old milk is what we're selling, old milk is what you're getting'? I seem to remember the whole company got done over for what was, I grant you, unacceptable trade practices. As it should be. I don't see any US meatpackers getting done over.

Like you said, try again.
rtrhead1 at 08:58 PM JST - 20th August

no, mitsubishi didn't do that. this is what they did:

New Cover-Up Allegations Hobble Japan's Fourth-Largest Automaker

By Anthony Faiola Washington Post Foreign Service Tuesday, July 6, 2004; Page E01

YOKOHAMA, Japan -- Shiho Okamoto was killed while walking home from a neighborhood video store with her two young sons when a 220-pound wheel fell off the front axle of a Mitsubishi truck moving behind her. The wheel crushed Okamoto's skull and spine.

To the Kanagawa Prefecture Police Department in Yokohama, a port city 19 miles south of Tokyo, the detached wheel seemed too odd to write off as an accident. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. -- Japan's fourth-largest automaker -- was implicated in 2000 in a cover-up scandal that resulted in the belated recall of about 600,000 cars and trucks, but company officials said they had resolved problems and repeatedly blamed poor maintenance by the trucks' owners.

Police investigating the January 2002 death of 29-year-old Okamoto, however, said they learned of a similar incident with a Mitsubishi bus in the southern city of Hiroshima and had evidence suggesting that company representatives were fanning out across Japan, replacing parts and begging vehicle owners not to go public with their experiences.

A raid on Mitsubishi offices five months ago yielded the evidence that exploded into one of the largest corporate scandals ever in Japan.

How about in 2004, again?

Clutch Box Defect Cover-up Scandal

Will break up text below soon.

May 21, 2004. Nobuteru Ishihara, Transport Minister of Japan, said that the incident is "so disgusting that I am speechless." Shoichi Nakagawa, minister of economy, trade and Industry, said that a letter Mitsubishi sent to was "perfunctory and business-like, and didn't include any apologies to the victims of accidents or a rehabilitation program."[Kyodo] Yomiuri reported that former chairman Takashi Usami, who was arrested earlier on suspicion of violating the Road Trucking Vehicle Law in cover up of truck hub defects, approved the cover-up of defective clutch housings.

I pulled this from a different article:

Also in 2000, Japan's transport ministry exposed Mitsubishi's cover-up after being led by a tipster to where documents marked secret were hidden. Three years later, the maximum fines for falsified reports by auto companies were increased to about $1.8 million. But ministry officials say Mitsubishi may be exempt from paying those higher fines because the "initial decision to cover up the defects" appears to have been made before the new law was enacted. http://www.autosafety.org/article.php?scid=93&did=946http://www.mitsubishisucks.com/cars/scandals/clutch/

So really, other than bashing the US, you have no clue what you are talking about. I remember watching this go down in the news when it happened. This is not me saying they do it so can we, it is me telling you that this holier than thou attitude is so hypocritical it is laughable. How about doing your homework before you come at me with this crap. About the snowbird milk thing, is a $1000 fine and a suspended sentance "getting done over"? That was for the head of the factory. How about a $4500 fine for the company? You're right, they sure got done over...
rtrhead1 at 08:59 PM JST - 20th August

>

Did Yukijirushi shrug its shoulders and say, 'Old milk is what we're selling, old milk is what you're getting'? I seem to remember the whole company got done over for what was, I grant you, unacceptable trade practices. As it should be. I don't see any US meatpackers getting done over. >

Judging from the above, I guess they did only shrug their shoulders...
rtrhead1 at 09:17 PM JST - 20th August

sorry cleo, i didn't answer your initial question. no, they didn't do it 3 times, because they covered it up for years before they recalled. but at least they only did 1...
rtrhead1 at 11:13 AM JST - 21st August

awww, don't wanna play anymore?