Although the government is likely to lift the ban on beef imports from the United States this month, 75.2 percent of surveyed consumers are unwilling to eat U.S. beef, according to results of a telephone survey released by Kyodo News on Tuesday.

The figure is up 2.7 percentage points over the previous survey taken a year ago.

The ratio of consumers willing to eat U.S. beef following Japan's resumption of imports was 21.2 percent, down 2.6 percentage points.

Conducted on Saturday and Sunday, the random survey included phone calls to 1,483 households with one or more eligible voters and received 1,009 valid replies.

Of the respondents who expressed unwillingness to eat U.S. beef, 62.5 percent cast doubt on the safety of the meat, while 20.6 percent said they can do without U.S. beef due to the availability of domestic and Australian beef.

Women intending to shun U.S. beef accounted for 82.9 percent of all female respondents, compared with 67.1 percent for men.

As to the question of what the government should do with respect to resuming American beef imports, 56.5 percent said it should call on the U.S. to conduct blanket testing of all slaughtered cattle for mad cow disease and 35.1 percent said there was a need to check whether conditions set for resumption of beef imports will be fully observed.

On Thursday, the Food Safety Commission is expected to recommend lifting the import ban on beef from cows aged up to 20 months as long as risky material is removed.