The United States’ shipments of beef to South Korea grew 13.7 percent last year to account for nearly half of the country’s beef imports. The country has reclaimed the top spot as the #1 importer of beef to South Korea, Reuters reports, 14 years after American beef was banned from the country due to a mad cow disease outbreak.

U.S. beef shipments totaled 177,445 tons, ahead of Australia’s 172,804 tons.

“U.S. beef imports surpassed Australian beef imports in 2017 and the reason behind that was Australia’s drought in 2017 and a tariff gap between the U.S. and Australia,” said Kim Kyung-hoon, a senior researcher at the Korea Trade and Investment Promotion Agency.

Source: Reuters