Audio: USMEF Hosts Veterinary Officials from Uzbekistan

A team of veterinary officials from Uzbekistan was recently in the United States for an educational visit covering all aspects of the U.S. beef and pork supply chain.

Yuri Barutkin, a U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) representative for the Greater Russia region, talks about the points emphasized during the trip, including steps taken by the U.S. meat industry to assure a high level of food safety and industry research being conducted to combat porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV). While open to U.S. beef imports, Uzbekistan is currently closed to U.S. pork due to PEDV-related restrictions.

With a population of nearly 30 million, Uzbekistan is the largest market in Central Asia. Because its population is more than 90 percent Muslim, pork is consumed in smaller quantities than beef, lamb or poultry. However, 25 percent of the country’s population does consume pork, and nearly all of it is currently imported from the European Union and Brazil. Barutkin points out that there is an opportunity for the U.S. meat industry to make great progress in the Uzbekistan market, especially within the meat processing sector.

TRANSCRIPT:

Joe Schuele: A team of veterinary officials from Uzbekistan was recently in the United States to examine U.S. beef and pork production practices. In this U.S. Meat Export Federation report, we speak with Yuri Barutkin, a USMEF representative in the Greater Russia region who accompanied the team.

Yuri Barutkin: This was an educational tour as we called it because our idea was to familiarize the vets in Uzbekistan about the food safety that is in place for U.S. beef and pork production. Just like many vets in many countries, they do have their concerns.

Joe Schuele: Uzbekistan is an emerging market that is currently open to U.S. beef, but unfortunately it was the only trading partner to close to U.S. pork during last year’s outbreak of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus, or PEDV.

Yuri Barutkin: We hope to address the issue of PEDV through the government, the U.S. government, eventually. But I think this time we just wanted to demonstrate to them the high level of food safety that is in place for the U.S. meat industry and that’s exactly what we’ve done, and I think because the visit was very detailed and thorough, we’ve managed to familiarize the Uzbekistan veterinarians with the whole production from farm to floor pretty much. This is a market with 30 million people, they have very little pork production. This is a predominantly Muslim population, however about 25 percent of their population are pork consumers. We see that the European Union and Brazil are sending their product over to Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan is in need of that product, especially for their processing industry, and this is one of the opportunities we might try to open up for the U.S. beef industry and pork industry.

Joe Schuele: For more on this and other trade issues, please visit USMEF.org. For the U.S. Meat Export Federation, I’m Joe Schuele.