China to Import US Meat, Wheat

China has agreed to allow the import of U.S. meat as of March 20 this year in a notice made public Thursday.The notice was made jointly by the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation and the State Administration of Inspection for Import and Export Commodities (AIIEC) on March 20 this year.

The notice, made in accordance with China's Law on Exit and Entry Quarantine of Animals and Plants and the Law on Food Hygiene of the People's Republic of China, and the Sino-U.S. Agreement on Agriculture Cooperation, says US meat imported by China must come from slaughterhouses approved by the Food Safety Inspection Bureau under the US Department of Agriculture.

The US Food Safety Inspection Bureau must conduct inspection and quarantine of all meat to be exported to China, and issue a hygiene certificate.

A government bulletin published Thursday also announced that so long as its own wheat industry is not threatened, China allows the import of all kinds of wheat from the United States, according to a government bulletin published today.

The bulletin was issued in accordance with a Sino-U.S. agreement on agricultural cooperation by the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation and the State Administration of Inspection of Import and Export Commodities.

The U.S. quarantine departments should inspect and quarantine the wheat which is to be exported to China and should provide quarantine certificates for the qualified batches, according to the bulletin.

The number of TCK spores in wheat imported from the US should not surpass the number written in the Sino-US agreement, and relevant research on TCK spores will be carried out between the two countries to make the calculation of the number of such spores more accurate, the bulletin said.

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