City celebrates first Uruguayan lamb meat shipment since 2001

   A group of U.S. and Uruguayan government officials, as well as local politicians and industry representatives, gathered in Philadelphia on Wednesday to celebrate the recent arrival of containerized shipments of frozen boneless lamb meat from Uruguay.
   The shipment, the first to arrive in the United States since 2001, was made possible through a ruling by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service that allowed entrance of Uruguayan lamb meats into the country.
   “The opening of the U.S. market for Uruguayan lamb meat is considered strategic given the high standards of requirements, the price level, high competition conditions and excellent prospects for the placement of other meat cuts in the future, generating opportunities for expanding Uruguayan exports but at the same time offering more product varieties for the consumer in the United States,” said Luis Almagro, Uruguay’s minister of foreign relations, in a statement.
   Uruguayan agricultural officials worked with USDA for several years to improve control over disease and ensure safe import of Uruguayan meats and produce. The USDA ruling allowing for the import of Uruguayan boneless lamb meat became effective in November 2013, at which time Uruguayan and U.S. authorities worked to establish protocols and certificates needed to comply with U.S. regulations. Both countries have been working together since 2007 to re-open the U.S. market to Uruguayan boneless lamb meat imports.
   The first shipment to arrive in the United States was unloaded from the Hamburg Süd vessel Limari at Philadelphia’s Packer Avenue Marine Terminal on March 8. The shipment contained 11 tons of lamb meat cuts, including frozen boneless lamb leg, loin eye and tenderloin “Nirea Premium Lamb,” from the Frigorifico San Jacinto Co. in Uruguay.