Canadian officials eye omnibus bill for COOL implications

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

by SUSAN MANN

Before Canada removes its threat to hit a variety of American products with more than a billion dollars of tariffs, U.S. legislators must repeal the Country of Origin Labelling law for beef and pork, says Agriculture and Agri-Food Minister Lawrence MacAulay.

Canadian officials are optimistic the law will be repealed after a measure to do so was included in an American government appropriations omnibus bill released Wednesday morning.

MacAulay says the COOL legislation harms Canadian and Mexican livestock farmers along with “U.S. processors and producers. It also disrupts the highly integrated North American beef industry supply chain.”

He adds Canada is hopeful the American move to repeal COOL will lead to a resolution in the trade dispute between Canada and the U.S. and “trade in beef and pork will be restored.”

Speaking to reporters during a teleconference Wednesday afternoon from Nairobi, Kenya, International Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland says they’re happy with the language in the omnibus bill covering the COOL repeal. She is attending the World Trade Organization 10th Ministerial Conference.

“I want to strongly encourage the Senate to get the job done and repeal COOL,” she says.

MacAulay agreed. “The bottom line is it (COOL) must be repealed or we will retaliate. That is simply how it is.”

American senators may vote on the omnibus bill on Thursday or Friday, Freeland says.

John Masswohl, Canadian Cattlemen’s Association director of government and international relations, says in a telephone interview both the House of Representatives and the Senate have to approve the omnibus bill. It would come up for a vote in the House on Friday at the earliest and then move on to the Senate for its vote.

He says both branches of the American government have to approve the omnibus bill because it is a massive piece of legislation containing more than 2,000 pages mainly designed to “fund the U.S. government for the next year. If this legislation doesn’t pass, then you have a U.S. government shut down.” The COOL repeal measures only covers about a page of the bill.

The House of Representatives voted in favour of a stand-alone bill to repeal COOL in the spring.  However, “the Senate never really got it done,” he says.

The substance of what the House passed is included in the omnibus bill being voted on this week. The only difference is chicken was included in the House bill to repeal COOL along with beef and pork but is not in the omnibus bill.

That means COOL will continue for chicken if the omnibus bill is passed. It will also continue for lamb and goats. Masswohl says those products weren’t part of the WTO challenge of COOL.

Freeland says Canadian officials are working hard with allies in the United States and “we are going to be in very close, hour-by-hour contact with them as this process unfolds.”

She described the situation as “very fast developing and unpredictable. What is important for our Canadian producers, Mexican allies and U.S. allies to know is we are very encouraged by the progress that we are seeing and we are monitoring it very closely.”

The Canadian Cattlemen’s Association is also encouraged there’s a provision to repeal COOL in the omnibus bill. But there’s “more work to do before the omnibus bill becomes law,” the association’s Dec. 16 news release says.

In the meantime, Canada is set to get its authorization on Friday from the WTO to implement the tariffs. Freeland says “we are expecting it on Friday but there are some technical reasons that could push that authorization to Monday (Dec. 21).”

There could be a slight delay in when Canada gets its authorization because the WTO ministerial meeting in Nairobi could take longer than anticipated to complete, she explains.

On Dec. 7, the WTO dispute settlement body arbitration panel released a decision saying Canadian livestock producers suffered annual damages due to COOL of more than C$1 billion. It was the latest decision in Canada’s favour in the long-running trade dispute.

Freeland says “the WTO ruling was about giving us the tools to pursue the repeal” of COOL. “That is how we are using it.”

COOL has been in effect since 2008. Since 2011, the WTO has ruled four times in Canada’s favour as it challenged COOL at the trade body. BF