Question: I am interested in knowing what kind of response you received from the Korean government.

Hegwood: They had questions related to where the animal came from and how meat products were disposed of. They also requested and we provided clarification about the measures that we have in place to assure the safety of the U.S. meat supply.

Q: I would like to ask for your evaluation of the Korean government's measures to suspend or prohibit the imports of beef from the United States. How would you evaluate that measure taken by the Korean government? And also in principle, up to now the Korean government has prohibited imports from any country that has had an outbreak of BSE. In line with that, probably beef from the United States will be prohibited also. What do you think about that?

Hegwood: A number of countries have taken steps to restrict exports of U.S. beef products as a result of this outbreak. Unfortunately, no country has followed the OIE guidelines with respect to the trade measures that should be put in place in a case such as this. The OIE is very clear and I think the scientific consensus is very clear that meat products that do not contain specified risk materials have no risk of transmitting BSE. Therefore those products should be considered safe for human consumption.

However, we recognize that that is a discussion we need to have in a much broader context and we would prefer to have that discussion within the OIE and we would encourage other countries to participate with us in those discussions. In fact, in August of this year, Secretary Venemen wrote to the Director of the OIE and specifically requested that the OIE undertake a review of these measures so that we can ensure that these measures are based on sound science.

Q: I have heard reports that in Japan that the United States has requested the Japanese government to open up the beef market if the United States were to assure of the safety. In other words, the press report was referring to a limited marketing opening. Have you made a similar request to the Korean government?

Hegwood: We did not make a request to the Japanese government to open up the beef market nor did we make a request of the Koreans to open up the beef market. We did ask that we try to find some flexibility for dealing with product that was in the pipeline before the BSE outbreak was confirmed in the United States.

BYK: Can I explain [to the reporters] what you mean by pipeline?

Hegwood: Sure.

Q: Did you make that similar request to both countries? Japan and Korea?

Hegwood: Yes.

Q: Taipei is moving to enforce a ban on U.S. beef for seven years. What do you think about that?

Hegwood: Well, I haven't seen... I have been on the road since Saturday. I haven't seen any updates on what other countries are doing. I can't comment on that.

Q: You have explained that the cattle, the infected cattle came from Canada. Isn't there any possibility that the infected cattle, after it arrived in the United States, infected other cattle that were raised in the same herd in the United States?

Hegwood: No, the disease can't be transmitted from one animal to the other, the only pathway that scientist are aware of for transmitting the disease is through animal feed.

Q: You denied any pressure but your request can be interpreted as pressure here. Do you think your request can make (word unclear) another round of anti-U.S. sentiments here. Actually, anti-U.S. civic groups are scheduled to hold a mass rally tomorrow against the U.S.

Hegwood: We didn't put any pressure on the Korean government.

Q: In regards about, my question is, don't you have any concerns about this particular issue evolving into a trade dispute?

Hegwood: I think from the discussions we've had with other countries, it is clear to us that there are concerns about, there are deep concerns about this disease. The way to deal with those concerns is to base risk decisions on sound science. As long as countries are basing their risk decisions on sound science we shouldn't have any trade disputes.

Q: What do you mean specifically by based on science? Isn't that contradictory, if you are saying that a government or a country should base an import ban on science that there are already reports released today that there is no one hundred percent guarantee of proff that even the muscle meat can be a source of conveying the prion or conveying the disease.

Hegwood: Well, I am not aware of any scientific evidence that the prions can be present in muscle meat. What I mean by sound science is that we believe that countries should base their measures on the standards that have been developed by the World Health Organization that go by the initials of OIE. That is the international accepted standard for sound science with respect to controlling animal diseases.

Q: You said or I believe you said there was no pressure from your side to get South Korea to lift the ban. I'd just like to ask. Was there a request to do so and did the South Korean government officials kind of say what conditions have to be met before they can do that in the meeting today?

Hegwood: No, we didn't request the Korean government to lift the ban nor did we have any discussion of the conditions for eventually resuming trade. I think we both agree that it's premature to have that discussion at this point because we need to get much further along in the investigation.

Q: Back in April there was an outbreak of BSE in Canada. And in May, the U.S., after that outbreak, prohibited all imports of live cattle and any other cattle products from Canada. And then, in October, the U.S. removed or released the ban and excluding SRM products has allowed for imports of muscle meat to come in and then two months after lifting the ban from Canada, you have an outbreak of the BSE in the U.S. Shouldn't someone look upon such fact that we cannot now have any confidence on the overall situation about this outbreak? In Canada, they are taking strict measures such as putting ear tags on all animals being raised in Canada, whereas in the U.S., such a system is not even in place for beef cattle. Taking these into consideration and your comment about securing the safety of U.S. products in the U.S. system, that doesn't seem to match.

Hegwood: Well, first to correct a few points, the outbreak in Canada was in May. We reopened the border to low risk products from Canada, such as muscle cuts of meat in August. We published a proposed rule in October that would allow for the possibility of resuming live cattle imports from Canada and other low risk BSE countries under certain conditions, very stringent conditions. I would point out that we are the only country in the world that has ever reopened its borders to a country with BSE. There is no connection between the measures that we have taken with respect to the borders of Canada in May and the current case of BSE in the United States. BSE has an incubation period that takes years. So it is most likely that the cow we just found in the United States became infected when it was young, before the feeding ban went into effect in both the United States and Canada. The U.S. and Canadian cattle markets and beef markets are very integrated. Consequently, we have cooperated very closely with the Canadian government in putting in place effective control measures for BSE. Because of these control measures we have the utmost confidence in the safety of the U.S. meat supply.

Q: Two questions. One, back in May with Canada at the outbreak, I understand that animals that were raised on the same farm where the Canadians had detected the one animal that had BSE, some of the animals that were raised in that same farm had been imported into the United States, or animals that were living in nearby farms were imported into the United States. My first question is, what have you done with those animals that were imported at that time from those farms in that area where Canada had the actual outbreak. My second question is, I also understand that the particular animal that had BSE in the United States in Washington, were also imported along with other animals at the time it was imported. No one is talking about what you are doing about those other animals that were imported at the same time.

Hegwood: Well, with respect to your second question, we are doing something about those animals. We have, as we have been reporting in our daily press briefings from Washington; one of our main goals right now is to track down every one of those animals. So that is one of the main focuses of the investigation. I don't have the information about the tracking of the animals from the Canadian investigation. I simply don't have that information. I don't know what the answer to that is.

Lambert: In the Canadian investigation once they identified, they identified three potential birth herds and they depopulated all of those herds. So there were no, none of those animals came into the United States.

Q: (unclear) South Korean officials said, because this issue is directly connected to the health of the Korean people, they will not lift the ban until they can scientifically prove that U.S. beef is safe. Do you think that is fair? I would like to know your thoughts on such opinion.

Hegwood: Well, we have the utmost confidence in the safety of the U.S. meat supply and we look forward at an appropriate time to having discussions with Korea about the conditions for resuming trade and we would certainly expect that those conditions would be science based.

Q: You keep on saying you would conduct the discussions based on science and also you say that muscle meat is safe and also the Korean government is saying that they will lift the ban based on science, if it is scientifically proven that the meat is safe. Is that, taking all these three points together, that sounds to me as if you are saying that lifting the ban for muscle meat is correct as far as science is concerned.

Hegwood: The international standards established by the OIE do not allow for restrictions or do not require restrictions on trade in muscle meat from countries even with a high incidence of BSE. As I stated previously, to date no country in the world has fully implemented the OIE guidelines. We recognize that countries including the United States have regulations and rules in place that may be inconsistent with those OIE guidelines.

We recognize that it takes time for countries to change rules and regulations. And we hope and expect that we can engage in a discussion with all members of the OIE about the need to base all of our rules and regulations on those science based standards. Okay last question please.

Q: You talk about meat in the pipeline and wanting flexibility about products in the pipeline. Can you give us a date about what that would mean, after which date, shipped before which date?

Hegwood: Well, we didn't discuss specific dates. Some countries are allowing product in that was shipped before December 23^rd which is when the case was confirmed in the United States.

Cormack (PAO): Are you willing to take one more question?

Hegwood: Okay, last one.

Q: Going back and looking at the trade volume (unclear), with the outbreak and with the import ban that the Korean government has imposed on Korean imports. What do you estimate the damage imposed on the U.S. beef industry because of such bans?

Hegwood: Well, it is difficult to say exactly because we don't know how long it will last. We don't know how many countries will ultimately take action. I think the best indicator you can look at of the potential economic impact of the outbreak is the future's market for cattle in the United States, as of Friday, was down about twenty percent.

Thank you.