By Ken Y-N (
November 9, 2005 at 23:55)
· Filed under Lifestyle, Polls
DIMSDRIVE Research carried out a survey at the end of October regarding importation of USA beef and beef consumption in general. As a vegetarian myself, I’m naturally ambivalent as to whether people can buy USA beef or not, but as an amateur statistician and UK citizen, I think the whole fuss about BSE and vCJD was overblown, as the figures show. I recognise that at first as it was an new variant of a terrible disease the risk could not be quantified and extreme caution was required, but it seems to have turned out to be not as virulent as first feared. Also, from a Japanese point of view, I suspect that the dangers of toxins from locally-caught seafood may be responsible for more deaths than vCJD in the UK! And don’t get me started on banning blood donations from people who have spent even just one day in the UK!
They interviewed 2,535 men and 3,468 women - 6,003 in total - from their internet monitor group. They performed a similar survey in December 2003, so the trend since then will also be pointed out where significant. The age breakdown was 1.3% in their teens, 18.1% from 20 to 29, 36.3% from 30 to 39, 27.1% from 40 to 49, 12.6% from 50 to 59, and 4.6% 60 or over. Note that I assume “beef” to mean the raw cuts (perhaps precooked too?) as a food ingredient, not restaurant meals. However, given the high figures for male purchases, either many are reporting their wives’ shopping habits or are including prepared food, but since convenience stores figure very low in the statistics, I suspect that the first is true, many men must be reporting their wives’ purchases.
Q: In the last month, about how often have you bought beef? (Sample size=6,003)
| |
This surveyOctober 2005 |
Last surveyDecember 2003 |
| Four or more times a week |
1.3% |
1.6% |
| Two or three times a week |
12.6% |
11.6% |
| Once a week |
27.5% |
31.5% |
| Two or three times a month |
24.2% |
27.9% |
| Once a month |
13.4% |
10.3% |
| Never |
21.0% |
17.1% |
Q: For those who have bought beef, where do you most often purchase it? (Sample size=4,742)
| Convenience store |
0.4% |
| Supermarket |
83.9% |
| Department store |
3.0% |
| Butchers |
6.8% |
| Co-operative |
4.9% |
| Others |
1.0% |
Q: For those who have bought beef, what one thing do you pay most attention to when you make your purchase? (Sample size=4,742)
| Price |
40.2% |
| Place of origin |
27.9% |
| Freshness |
13.9% |
| Quality |
7.8% |
| Best-before date |
5.7% |
| Grade |
2.4% |
| Processor (?) |
0.9% |
| Vendor |
0.4% |
| Other |
0.8% |
Q: What was the country of origin of the beef you currently purchase? (Sample size=4,742, multiple answer)
| Japan |
62.8% |
| Australia |
52.5% |
| New Zealand |
8.7% |
| Canada |
2.4% |
| Brazil |
0.4% |
| China |
0.3% |
| Argentina |
0.2% |
| Other |
0.1% |
| Don’t know |
10.6 |
Q: This year it is said that USA beef imports will restart; how do you feel about this? (Sample size=6,003)
| Extremely uneasy |
28.1% |
| A little uneasy |
38.2% |
| Not really uneasy |
24.0% |
| Not at all uneasy |
6.0% |
| Don’t know |
3.7% |
Q: If imports of USA beef resumes, will you buy any? (Sample size=6,003)
| Yes |
22.5% |
| No |
41.5% |
| Don’t know |
36.0% |
Q: For those who won’t buy USA beef, if which points were improved would you buy? (Sample size=2,490, multiple answer)
| If USA tested all cattle |
62.6% |
| If it was scientifically proven safe |
42.6% |
| If the particularly dangerous parts were completely removed on importation |
31.8% |
| If only cattle that hadn’t eaten bone meal feed were sold |
28.5% |
| If the origin of beef was displayed at all points of sale |
22.9% |
| If the age of beef was displayed at all points of sale |
12.5% |
| Others |
3.9% |
| Regardless of what was improved I wouldn’t buy |
20.1% |
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Ready-cooked frozen foods in Japan » 世論 What Japan Thinks said,
March 11, 2006 @ 00:08
[…] The “safety” reply seems a bit vague, but I think it is perhaps getting at checking the country of origin of the ingredients, such as ensuring it doesn’t contain US beef or Chinese vegetables, which do have a bit of a poor image. japan, opinion poll, survey, public opinion, frozen food, imode [link] […]
Safety Japan » 世論 What Japan Thinks said,
September 7, 2006 @ 23:14
[…] Product and service safety has recently become a big issue in Japan, but quite frankly blown out of all proportion by the media. First of all there was the truely problematic Aneha scandal of blocks of flats and hotels not being built according to the building codes, thus liable to collapse even in moderately strong earthquakes. Next up was US beef, blown up out of all proportion, especially considering that not many people in Japan worry about (or even know about) the human growth hormones and antibiotics that are far more likely to aversely affect your health compared to BSE or vCGD, let alone the heavy metals in Japanese fish or the second-hand smoke in the average Japanese restaurant. Later was Schindler’s Lifts, which, as the linked story suggests, the brouhaha was caused as much by the company’s failure to appear sorry enough as by the death from the hardware failure itself. Note that at the end of August a man died after falling into an empty lift shaft, but this got very little press coverage and no mention of the make of the faulty equipment, at least in the linked story, so I would put good money on it not being one of Schindler’s. […]
deda cherry said,
April 4, 2007 @ 04:13
I don’t blame S. Korea and Japan for caution with American beef. I won’t eat it either nor any meat that has been mass produced, irradiated , hormone infested and sold through a supermarket.
These days I have to go out of my way and pay alot more to find wholesome natural food that has not been genetically altered or irradiated and loaded with hormones. There are many others I know who do the same as I do.
What makes me furious is that the American people are for the most part completely unaware of what has happened to their food or what effect it will have on their health.
It would seem logical that along with the mandatory list of ingredients on food items that there would also be in the list -’bovine hormone’ infested along with ‘genetically altered’ and ‘irradiated’ but the corporate powers that poison the public prefer that these points be hidden from the public so as not to influence the purchase of these products and so have persuaded the government to overlook the interest of the people in favor of commerce and industry.
The longest human studies involving eating irradiated food only lasted for 15 weeks.
US Army tests were done on irradiated meat in 1977 which found high levels of benzene, new chemicals known as ‘unique radiolytic products’ were identified and recognized as carcinogenic. Later tests identified other chemicals shown to induce genetic toxicity.
Studies show that irradiation damages food by breaking up molecules and creating free radicals, causes a loss of 5-80% of many vitamins, and damages the natural digestive enzymes found in raw foods. Could this be is why America is getting fat?