When hog producers and industry representatives get together, especially internationally as they did in Des Moines, IA recently at the World Pork Expo, problems in the industry certainly get discussed, with the M-COOL issue being no exception.
Andrew Dickson, the general manager of Manitoba Pork Council says more Americans recognize the need to resolve Mandatory Country of Origin Labelling.

The World Trade Organization will release its ruling in late July or early August on whether changes made to M-COOL in May 2013 brought the United States into compliance with its international treaty obligations.
Dickson says Canada is expected to win which will open the door to retaliatory tariffs on imported U.S. products. While winning is most always good, in this case it starts a trade war, which often hurts all sides.

“We emphasized to them that … can we not try to get round that by looking at some alternatives in terms of a solution to M-COOL,” he said. “It became very clear that everybody is waiting to see what the panel will do before taking any further action. We know there’s a growing groundswell in basic opinion amongst industry and politicians that something needs doing to address the matter.”

Dickson says it is hard to expect the U.S. government to do something because essentially this is legislation passed by Congress so there is a greater need to move forward in terms of looking at some alternative legislative vehicles to get some amendments in place.

“We also pointed out that we need to get M-COOL out of the way so that we can get back to our normal trading patterns but more importantly we have other issues that we need to deal with like how are we going to coordinate a North American response to a disease outbreak.” he said. “This PEDv outbreak has illustrated that something that happens in the United States will have a direct impact on producers here in Canada, not in just a theoretical sense but actually in practical terms.”

Dickson says, after seven or eight years, everybody realises the need to move on to other issues, but the two countries must first resolve the M-COOL issue first.
As the MPC gm points out so adequately, there are those in the U.S. standing up, taking notice, and requesting the right action.

Audrey Adamson, the v-p for domestic policy with the National Pork Producers Council, a U.S. organization called on the U.S. government to address M-COOL to head off retaliatory trade action.
In May 2013, in response to a WTO order to bring M-COOL into compliance with its international trade obligations, the U.S. made things worse under the legislation by adding other labelling requirements and stopped the mixing of product from animals originating in different countries, namely in this case livestock coming from Canada and Mexico.

Adamson says Canada and Mexico have made it clear, if the U.S. loses again, they will retaliate.
“This retaliatory action, meaning tariffs on U.S. products coming into both Canada and Mexico, and it is not going to be just pork and beef,” she says. “It will be manufactured goods, wine from California, furniture, berries, cherries, and other things going into these other countries.”

Adamson says it becomes a much broader issue than just a case over the labelling of meat, especially with many countries negotiating the Trans Pacific Partnership, including Canada and the U.S.
“We (meaning the Americans) need to lead by example to live up to our trade obligations to show our largest trading partners, yes we do live up to our trade obligations,” she says. “If not, they will be able to retaliate and this will cost U.S. jobs and it will very much damage the trading relationship.”

That is why producers in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico want the U.S. to resolve this without going that next step because Canada and Mexico could start the trade war by the middle of 2015, or even earlier.

One sees these as minor issues maybe when watching the daily news of what is going on in the rest of the world, but these issues need resolution, too, and with some more understanding and less politics, it could happen sooner than later. •
— By Harry Siemens