Signature drive started for beef referendum

The groups aim to collect 90,000 signatures in 14 days to express their opposition to the lifting of a ban on imports of U.S. bone-in beef products at “the expense of the people's health and the environment,” Consumers' Foundation Chairman Hsieh Tien-jen said Sunday.

Expressing his discontent with the government's refusal to re-open talks with the U.S. on the issue in defiance of the people's will, Hsieh wondered, “Who's the boss? It's confusing.”

“The government doesn't seem like a government. That's a terrible thing,” he added.

The protocol with the United States on relaxing import restrictions on U.S. beef products will set a precedent for similar agreements with other countries in the world, argued Gaston Wu, the secretary-general of the foundation.

He said Canada and many European countries that were recently listed as areas affected by mad cow disease also wanted to ask Taiwan to lift the ban on beef products from their countries.

Under the protocol, U.S. bone-in beef, ground beef and offal that have not been contaminated with “specific risk materials” will be allowed to enter Taiwan, while other cattle parts, such as brains, skulls, eyes, spinal nerve roots from cattle over 30 months of age will remain on the banned list.

Chen Su-li, a volunteer for health advocacy group the John Tung Foundation, contended that there is still no test that can be used to detect prion-infected brain in cattle younger than 30 months.

Prions cause several diseases, including Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in humans, bovine spongiform encephalitis (BSE, or “mad cow disease”) in cows, and scrapie in sheep.

Sending experts to the United States to make on-the-spot checks of the quality of U.S. beef products is not realistic because of the vast expanse of the U.S, said Huang Su-te, a representative of the Homemaker's Union and Foundation.

The Referendum Law stipulates that the signatures of 0.5 percent of eligible voters in the last presidential election — approximately 86,000 — must be collected in order to be able to apply to hold a referendum. In the second application stage, five percent of eligible voters — approximately 860,000 — must sign the petition before it can be screened by the Referendum Review Committee.

Hsieh urged members of the public to download signature forms from the Web sites of the above-mentioned groups to support the referendum initiative and protect their rights and the rights of their children.

Subscribe to The China Post and save 25%. Click here

SharePrintEmail

Write a Comment

Enter your comments - 3000 characters max

Type in image code

Submit

 Receive China Post promos Respond to this email