| SUBSCRIBE MARKETS WEATHER LINKS HOME |
|
Manufacturers and processors react tardily to dairy labelling amendmentFood manufacturers and processors, retail and consumer sectors are furiously protesting an amendment regarding dairy ingredients in processed products. But they should have known it was comingby BARRY WILSONIt was a small political gift to retiring rural Ontario Liberal MP Rose-Marie Ur the June day when, in her name, the House of Commons agriculture committee tacked onto a food inspection bill what seemed like a non-controversial amendment on dairy labelling.The proposal, as sold by political supporters, would simply make sure that any product which claimed it contained a dairy ingredient like butter, cream or ice cream actually did contain that product. It also would stop the international or inter-provincial marketing of products with a dairy term on the label if they are dairy substitutes. MPs from all four parties in the Commons supported it as representatives of Dairy Farmers of Canada (DFC) sat smiling in the visitors' gallery. Ur, 12 years in the House as a pro-farmer MP from the Lambton-Middlesex area of southwest Ontario, is retiring after almost losing in 2004. She is in the parliamentary record as moving the amendment. But the permanence of her last memorable political act is in jeopardy this autumn as the full Commons and then the Senate will have to decide if the amendment and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) bill it is attached to make it into law before an expected winter election. During the summer months since MPs approved the bill and sent it to the Commons, opponents in the dairy processing, food manufacturing, retail and consumer sectors have raised a furious chorus of objections. They see in the amendment -- and its wording about banning dairy substitute products if there is a dairy term on the label -- a way for the dairy farmer lobby to keep off the market such popular competitor products as margarine that has whey as a listed ingredient and other popular products like Cheese Whiz that do not contain cheese but do have small amounts of dairy ingredients listed. The lobby against the amendment represents tens of billions of dollars of economic activity, hundreds of thousands of jobs and millions of votes. Even though defenders of the amendment say opponents are hysterically anti-supply management, at the very least the government will have to present an unassailable legal opinion that the amendment will not do what the critics allege, or it will have to produce an amendment to make the point clear. It appears to be a case of sloppy wording added to the ultimate legal document -- a piece of House of Commons legislation that sets the rules -- without sufficient scrutiny. But, in truth, despite their insinuations of an unholy and secretive manoeuvre by dairy farmers and their allies in Parliament, the main problem here is that the powerful economic and political forces now up in arms were not paying attention. The issue of dairy labelling has been before Parliament for years in private members' bills, debated but not approved. DFC made it clear in a Feb. 15 appearance before the committee that it wanted to see the CFIA bill used as a vehicle for a labelling amendment. Liberal MPs agreed and promised to do something about it. The manufacturers, processors, retailers and consumers now at full throat knew something was coming and should have made certain they and MPs understood the implications of the proposed wording before it was approved. These powerful interests know how politics works. They shouldn't now be alleging this dairy labelling proposal came on little cats' feet in the dead of night.
It didn't. But the allegation has given the election-bound Liberals a public relations headache they don't need.BF Barry Wilson is a member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery specializing in agriculture.
|