Photo/Illutration Hiroshi Moriyama, center, the secretary-general of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, greets Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Osaka on July 11. (Yoshinori Mizuno)

Although Japan and China have cleared hurdles for a resumption of Japanese beef exports after a 24-year hiatus, it remains unclear when shipments will start.

The two countries finally activated a key animal health and quarantine agreement on July 11. They ratified the accord in 2019.

Officials in Tokyo noted that Beijing could yet again delay negotiations for political reasons. Thus, the latest development will only remove one major hurdle to the resumption of exports that have been stopped since 2001 following an outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), popularly known as mad cow disease.

Hiroshi Moriyama, the secretary-general of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, met on July 11 in Osaka with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, who said the animal quarantine agreement would go into effect that day.

Moriyama also heads a multi-partisan group of lawmakers focused on Japan-China relations and after his meeting with He played up the agreement in a speech for an LDP candidate running in the July 20 Upper House election.

“(The quarantine agreement) will lead to the resumption of exports to China for the first time in 24 years,” Moriyama said.

Government sources said the LDP and prime minister’s office had been pushing for diplomatic results that could help the party in the Upper House election campaign.

China in late June agreed to resume seafood imports from Japan, except for 10 prefectures including Fukushima. It slapped a ban on imports in August 2023 after Japan began releasing tons of treated radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant into the ocean.

On July 11, Beijing approved the registration of three Japanese companies for exporting seafood to China.

Government sources also said He provided an optimistic appraisal to Moriyama about future loans of giant pandas to Japan.

China’s push to improve ties with Japan is clearly linked with the increasing confrontation orchestrated by U.S. President Donald Trump with his tariff trade wars.

A former ambassador to China speculated that Beijing was attempting to pull Japan away from the U.S. orbit because of  uncertainties surrounding the direction of U.S. policy toward China.

But with surveys showing the LDP facing a drubbing in the Upper House election, China might have to recalibrate its policy toward Japan if the ruling coalition loses its majority in the Upper House and Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is forced to resign.

And with this year marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, China is planning to hold a range of events to mark its victory over Japan, which inevitably will be used for propaganda purposes. That could unleash another round of anti-Japan sentiment lingering from the country’s military aggression in China in the years leading up to and during the war.

(This article was written by Nen Satomi and Haruka Suzuki in Tokyo and Ryo Inoue in Beijing.)

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