05/13/05 Japan by July? Trade deficit big drop

In the glass is half full category come this bit of optimism by U.S.D.A. Secretary Mike Johanns. He believes Japan will reopen its market to U.S. beef by July. JOHANNS: Every indication is that we're moving in the right direction and of course it's going slowly and in a meticulous way, but I still continue to be very encouraged. The slow and meticulous part referred to by Johanns is Japan's regulatory process to resume beef imports from the U.S. The most recent development occurred last week when Japan's Food Safety Commission recommended that its nation end full b.s.e. testing, instead testing only animals twenty one months of age and older. Thank a drop of imports from China and increasing U.S. exports as the reason our trade deficit with other nations experienced its largest monthly drop since December 2001. Part of our increase in American exports was in the food sector. But despite the decrease in the monthly trade deficit, the U.S. trade deficit increased in March with three of our major trading partners & the European Union, Japan, and Mexico. Idaho Governor Dirk Kempthorne and a delegation representing various Idaho based companies and organizations will be part of a two week trade mission to Asia starting tomorrow. The latest Northwest based trade mission will include stops in Toyko, Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai, and Taipai. Kempthorne says the delegation's approach to this mission will be an aggressive one in hopes of attracting more business to Idaho. KEMPTHORNE: One of the things that we'll be able to do in each of these stops is hold up a "Forbes" magazine and show them that this capital city is ranked number one in the nation for being dynamic in the area of business. That captures the imagination of a lot of folks in the Asian markets. A Cambridge Massachusetts based biotech company says it is testing a potential vaccine for West Nile Virus. And according to scientists at Ambicus, early tests look promising. They say the new vaccine produced enough antibodies to fight off the disease in all but one of the sixty people who were vaccinated. Two more phases of testing are scheduled, and if those prove as successful as the early round, then the product could be released to the market in three years at the earliest. The latest U.S.D.A. winter wheat production estimates have the current crop at over 1.5 billion bushels. That is better than previous U.S.D.A. estimates and roughly 91 million bushels more than the 2004  05 crop.