Fukushima, Iwate, Tochigi farmers resume shipping cattle+

FUKUSHIMA, Japan, Aug. 28 Kyodo -
Farmers in Fukushima, Iwate and Tochigi prefectures on Sunday resumed shipping cattle to market, as the central government on Thursday lifted a ban on shipments after deciding sufficient measures have been taken to ensure no radioactive contaminated beef is marketed.
In Fukushima, 23 farms each delivered one beef cattle to a meat processing plant in Koriyama, where the animals will be slaughtered Monday. Meat from the animals will be tested for radiation before being shipped to market, the local government said.
The Fukushima prefectural government has said it will test one cattle per farm for radiation, at the rate of once every three months, to confirm their safety.
As for cattle from the zone closer to the nuclear power plant -- located within a 20- to 30-kilometer radius from the plant -- the local government said it will conduct blanket testing for radiation.
On July 19, the government ordered Fukushima farmers to stop shipments after radioactive cesium exceeding the government-set limit of 500 becquerels per kilogram was detected in beef from the prefecture's cattle in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant crisis that erupted in March.
One of the cattle farmers, Yukiya Nakagawa, 69, expressed anxiety at the possible fall in price for his cattle at auction, saying, ''Although I am rejoicing at the lifting of the shipment ban, the auction will not proceed in a usual manner.''
In Iwate, a combined 50 cattle were delivered to a meat processing plant in Shiwa to be slaughtered. Some 7,419 farms which did not feed their cattle rice straw contaminated with cesium were given priority in restarting shipments.
Cattle from these farms will be tested for radiation at the rate of one cattle per farm. The Iwate government will also conduct blanket testing starting on Sept. 5 on 127 farms which fed or are suspected to have fed cattle with radiation-contaminated straw.
In Tochigi, 70 farms each shipped one cattle to a local meat processing plant.
Cattle shipments have now resumed from all four northeastern prefectures that had been ordered by the government between July and early August to halt shipments following the detection of radioactive cesium in fed straw. Miyagi Prefecture was the first to resume shipments after the ban there was lifted on Aug. 19.