Brussels, 18/03/2011 (Agence Europe) - After a year of dispute, the EU and Canada have managed to settle (provisionally at any rate) their disagreement at the World Trade Organisation about the EU ban on hormone-treated beef (DS 351) which remains banned in Europe. Canada will end its trade reprisals against Europe.
On 17 March, the European Commission and the Canadian government signed a draft agreement on a roadmap which, once confirmed, will provide a temporary settlement to the dispute. The bulk of the preliminary agreement was reached in November 2010 and stipulates that Canada will suspend all its penalties on the import of goods from the EU - additional customs duty levied since 1999 in retaliation against the ban on imports into the EU of hormone-treated beef from Canada - in exchange for which Canada will be granted extra export quotas for high-quality beef from cattle not treated with growth hormones. An additional quota of 1,500 tonnes of non-hormone-treated beef will be granted by August 2012, and this might be increased to 3,200 tonnes the following year. The EU and Canada will assess the situation in 2013 and decide whether or not to continue with this arrangement indefinitely. John Clancy, spokesperson for EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht, said that it was an important step towards settling an old dispute and would relieve EU exporters from the burden of the extra import duties in Canada.
The hormone-treated beef disputes between the EU and Canada, and the EU and the US (DS 350) kicked off in the 1980s and have been the subject of several rulings at the WTO. In 1996, Washington and Ottawa lodged a complaint at the WTO, which agreed with them. The US and Canada then imposed penalties on certain products from the EU. Provisional agreement was reached with the US (similar to this new deal with Canada) in May 2009 (see EUROPE 9903). (E.H./transl.fl)