MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

WTO rules against EU import ban of beef with hormones

The World Trade Organization on Monday backed United States and Canadian arguments against the European Union's import ban on beef treated with hormones.

"The panel's findings on the EU ban are an important victory for all U.S. farmers and ranchers" US Trade Representative Susan Schwab said in a statement. "EU consumers should have access to US beef: it is of high quality, safe and competitive." The EU says beef treated with certain hormones poses a risk to human health. But Canada and the US have persuaded the WTO that there is no solid scientific evidence to support a ban. However WTO also found fault with US and Canada because of retaliatory sanctions they imposed on EU imports such as Roquefort cheese, truffles and Dijon mustard. The WTO panel said the U.S. and Canada should have initiated new legal proceedings in order to maintain the sanctions, but ruled that the continued illegality of the EU ban on hormone-treated beef meant the sanctions were justified. In 1999, the global commerce body authorized Washington and Ottawa to impose 125 million US dollars worth of duties a year on European goods, sanctions which remain in force. The ruling specifically says that the US and Canada did not breach Article 22.8 of the WTO dispute settlement treaty, which defines when countries may impose punitive sanctions on others. It upheld only part of Brussels' claims that the US and Canada committed unilateral actions deemed illegal by the WTO. Brussels brought the case back to the WTO in February 2005 after Washington and Ottawa refused to review their sanctions in light of new EU directives upholding the bans. The EU has "criticized Canada and the US for unilaterally maintaining these measures despite the fact that the EU has subsequently conducted a new scientific risk assessment to show that such hormone-treated meat presents unacceptable risks" the 27-nation bloc said in a statement. The WTO ruling upheld that the EU failed to properly assess risks before banning certain hormones in beef imports. Basically it ruled against new EU legislation passed in 2003 to permanently ban the use of hormone oestradiol 17b in meat products. The panel said EU assessments on oestradiol 17b fail to show a direct link between a risk of cancer and consumption of hormone-treated beef. The WTO also ruled against provisional bans on five other growth-promoting hormones, including testosterone, progesterone and zeranol because the EU failed to prove there was too little scientific evidence to undertake proper risk assessments. Canada's Trade Minister David Emerson also hailed the ruling as a victory "the WTO has once again sided with Canada by confirming that the ban is inconsistent with the EU international trade obligations".