Analysis of the Citizens’ Opinions towardsthe Regulatory Policy for β-agonist

• Main Authors: Wu, Ming-Pin, 吳名彬
• Other Authors: Lee, Pei-Shan
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2013
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/g2ps4u

碩士 === 國立中正大學 === 政治學研究所 === 101 === β-agonist is used to feed the animals to increase their lean meat proportion and the feed conservation ratio. However, there is the possibility that it is retained in the animal’s body, and later on ingested by people after eating the livestock products. Since Sept. 11, 2012, Taiwan has permitted the importation of beef with a residual of 0.01 ppm Ractopamine, but the control of β-agonist is necessary for people’s safety when they consume livestock products. Therefore, the public is deeply concerned with this issue, which has shifted from being just a pure food safety issue to a political debate, and has also affected the Taiwan-U.S. relationship. This study is mainly to analyze the citizens’ opinions towards the regulatory policy for β-agonist and explore the policy of banning the β-agonist in livestock products, including the existing domestic regulatory policy and the regulatory policy for imported meat products. Regulation has already been the primary role of governmental administration or public policies, and creating regulatory policies has become one of the core functions of the government. In this study, β-agonist belongs to social regulation , which is usually considered to protect the benefits of citizens and consumers, especially when it comes to controlling the quality standards, safety level and pollution. Through the literature review, summation and analyses of interview results, this study obtains the findings as follows: citizens show insufficient confidence towards the regulatory policy for β-agonist; the government is not successful in determining the source of β-agonist feed; the illegal practitioners mix the products with β-agonist to avoid inspection; governmental instruction and risk evaluation are not enough; the citizens show a positive attitude towards the policy of separating pork from beef and insist the banning of β-agonist on pork; labeling the origin of beef should be made compulsory; the permission for the importation of beef containing Ractopamine considers political and foreign trade factors; the imported pork shouldn’t contain Ractopamine, which seems unable to conform to the SPS Standards Regulations; the permission for the importation of beef containing Ractopamine from the U.S. is a policy of zero-sum game. Based on the findings, this paper proposes five specific suggestions for the policy namely, improving the current regulatory policy to avoid the regulatory failure that is currently happening and enhance the people’s trust towards the regulatory policy; actively promoting the Traceability System of products; maintaining the policy of separating pork from beef and coping with the international demands; strengthening the policy advocating and providing adequate and necessary information to the citizens; the policy planning and implementation should avoid the zero-sum game, and striving to create the opportunity for a mutually beneficial result. These could serve as reference for the government in formulating or revising the related policies.