WTO Cases • Volume 12 • Number 22 • 18th June 2008
US and Canada Appeal WTO Beef Hormone Dispute Ruling
In the most recent development of an ongoing transatlantic dispute, the US and Canada have filed appeals to a WTO panel ruling that found fault with the two countries’ method of implementing trade sanctions.
The US and Canadian claims, both submitted on 9 June (WT/DS320/13; WT/DS321/13), follow an appeal filed by the EU late last month. In that claim, Brussels protested the panel’s finding that its ban on imports of hormone-treated beef was illegal. The EU also faulted the panel for stopping short of explicitly ordering Washington and Ottawa to remove the extra duties they had imposed in retaliation to the ban (WT/DS320/12 and WT/DS321/12).
In a ruling circulated in March, the panel found fault with all three parties involved in the dispute (see BRIDGES Weekly, 2 April 2008, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/08-04-02/story1.htm).
For the EU, the panel ruled that a lack of adequate scientific risk assessment meant that the import ban on hormone-treated beef, which Brussels modified in response to an earlier panel ruling, still failed to comply with the requirements of the WTO Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures.
The panel further ruled that the US and Canada had not followed proper procedures in continuing their trade retaliation against the ban. Washington and Ottawa have retained over US$125 million in annual sanctions on EU exports, such as Dijon mustard and Roquefort cheese, based on their unilateral determination that the EU’s modifications to its ban were not sufficient to bring it into compliance with a 1998 WTO ruling. The panel maintained that the US and Canada should have initiated legal proceedings to determine whether the import ban still violated WTO rules in order to maintain the sanctions.
In its appeal filed last week, the US stated that the panel’s finding on that topic “is in error and is based on erroneous findings on issues of law and legal interpretations.”
For its part, Brussels welcomed the panel’s ruling that US and Canadian retaliatory tariffs breached WTO rules, but disagreed with the panel’s determination that its ban was illegal, calling the assessment “flawed.”
“The panel made legal errors when it found that the new EU hormones directive does not comply with the WTO Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures,” the EU appeal stated.
The dispute began more than a decade ago, when a WTO panel first ruled that the US and Canada could impose punitive tariffs on European products to retaliate against Brussels’ ban on imports of beef produced with six growth-promoting hormones that are common in the US and Canada.
ICTSD reporting; “Notification of an Other Appeal by Canada,” WWW, 16 June 2008; “Notification of an Other Appeal by the United States,” WWW, 16 June 2008; “EU appeals WTO ruling over US beef hormone ban,” EU BUSINESS, 2 June 2008; “EU appeals WTO panel ruling on US and Canadian sanctions on EU goods in hormone-treated meat dispute,” EUROPEAN COMMISSION, 29 May 2008.