Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz concluded his trade mission to the United States where he advocated for measures that would bring the U.S. into full compliance with its WTO obligations on the mandatory Country-of-Origin Labelling (COOL).
“Our government is focused on ensuring that Canadian producers will be able to gain and maintain broader access to diverse markets, to bolster the Canadian economy. COOL continues to have a negative economic impact on the Canadian livestock industry and we are standing with Canadian cattle and hog producers against unfair mandatory Country-of-Origin Labelling in the U.S.,” said Ritz. “Our government will consider all options, including extensive retaliatory measures, should the U.S. not achieve compliance by May 23, 2013, as mandated by the WTO.”
In Washington, Ritz met with his counterpart USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack to express Canada’s strong disappointment with the proposed Country-of-Origin Labelling regulatory changes put forward by the U.S. Ritz underlined that the proposed changes will not bring the U.S. into compliance with its WTO obligations and will further increase discrimination against exports of cattle and hogs from Canada, increasing damages to the Canadian industry.
Ritz and Secretary Vilsack also discussed opportunities for collaboration and the integrated nature of the Canada-U.S. agriculture and food supply chain that supports jobs and growth on both sides of the border.
They both instructed their officials to work on ways to further enhance collaboration in a number of thematic areas, including third country adoption of science-based standards, new technologies and agricultural innovation.
Over the past three years, approximately $38 billion in agricultural trade has crossed the Canada-U.S. border annually.
“As each other’s largest trading partners, we need to work together to ensure trade is contributing to the productivity and competitiveness of the sector for the benefit of our farmers,” said Minister Ritz.
