Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi expressed hope Wednesday that North American beef imports will resume as a move in that direction emerged the day before in the government's independent mad cow panel.
"It would be good to have circumstances that allow imports of safe beef," Koizumi told reporters at his office, referring to the likelihood that imports could resume as early as December.
Imports have been banned since the brain-wasting disease, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, was discovered in Canada in May 2003 and the United States the following December.
Experts on the panel under the Food Safety Commission agreed Tuesday that certain types of U.S. and Canadian beef have an extremely low risk of being contaminated with the brain-wasting disease.
During its meeting, members of the panel also noted that countermeasures taken at U.S. slaughterhouses and meat-processing facilities are almost the same as those used in Japan.
The accord paves the way for the panel to give, possibly later this month, its scientific endorsement to the safety of U.S. and Canadian beef that comes from cows aged up to 20 months old.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said the move gives the government a "bright prospect" for resuming the imports.