U.S. agriculture groups want to resolve the COOL dispute

Canadian Cattlemen's Association Action News

January 30, 2012

CCA President Travis Toews attended the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) Annual Meeting earlier this month where he had several opportunities to update Farm Bureau delegates on the World Trade Organization (WTO) Panel report on U.S. country of origin labeling law (COOL).

The discussions identified how the U.S. will be better off by eliminating the discrimination that COOL has created for Canadian and Mexican livestock imported into the U.S. Although COOL has not produced any quantifiable benefits for U.S. agriculture, it puts at least 9,000 U.S. meat processing jobs at risk though closure of excess processing capacity. Once U.S. packing facilities start closing, the U.S. livestock producers that rely on the closed facilities will be negatively impacted.

Also explored was the potential for Canada to take retaliatory action should the U.S. not comply with the WTO ruling. With Canada being such a huge importer of U.S. agricultural and prepared food products, the AFBF concluded that it is in the best interest of U.S. farmers and ranchers to resolve the COOL dispute as soon as possible and not delay a resolution through an appeal. The AFBF expressed this by passing a policy to, "support country of origin labeling that conforms with COOL parameters and meets WTO requirements."

Furthermore, AFBF directed its staff to "Encourage the USTR not to appeal the WTO ruling on COOL, but to go straight to a legislative resolution."

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