Japan is likely to forgo an expected safeguard step on beef imports in August, according to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry Thursday.

Some had expected Japan would impose safeguard import curbs on beef next month for the first time in two years to protect domestic farmers and related businesses due to surging beef imports in April and May.

But the trade data of the ministry showed that year-on-year growth of beef imports in the April-June quarter fell below 17 percent, which is the threshold for the emergency import restrictions to take effect.

Japan was set to automatically raise its tariff by 11.5 percentage points from 38.5 percent to 50 percent on Aug. 1 under a 1993 World Trade Organization safeguard, if there was a year-on- year increase in beef imports over the threshold in the three- month period on a cumulative quarterly basis.

Smaller-than-expected imports in the April-June quarter resulted from importers delaying customs clearance of beef imports by temporarily storing them in bond to register for July, the ministry said.

Japan's beef imports sharply dropped due to the nation's import ban on US beef following the discovery of mad cow disease in the United States in late December 2003.

Despite the continued import ban on American beef, total beef imports have recently rebounded, chiefly from Australia, resulting in a jump in imports of fresh, chilled and frozen beef in April and May.

In the April-June quarter, the year-on-year increase of fresh and chilled beef imports was 13 percent and that of frozen beef imports was 9 percent, according to the data.

The data also indicated that Japan will forgo a safeguard import curb on pork for the first time in five years as the imports fell short of a threshold for the emergency step.

Source: Xinhua