A breakfast-time meeting has been arranged today in Dublin between the US Secretary for Agriculture, Mr Daniel R. Glickman, and the EU Commissioner for Agriculture, Mr Franz Fischler, in an attempt to avert a trade war over the ban on imports of hormone-treated beef into the EU.
The meeting takes place in conjunction with the World Meat Congress at the RDS, which has been organised by the Irish Food Board. More than 600 delegates from 30 countries are attending the congress.
At press conferences yesterday, both men held to their stated positions, with Mr Glickman acknowledging that it was unlikely that the EU would remove the ban.
"The ball is in their court now and it is time to talk," said Mr Glickman, who pointed out that the US was being forced to look after its agricultural interests having won its case in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) arbitration. Mr Glickman said that the US had "won the battle" three times by going the stated routes in the WTO case and the matter could not be allowed continue indefinitely.
But in a move which suggested some softening of attitude on the issue, he said the US would look very carefully at new scientific evidence being put forward by the EU.
However, at his press conference, Mr Fischler said there was no question of the ban being removed. The strength of the new scientific evidence showed that some of the hormones used were a danger to public health.
He said that the EU would now seek to enact legislation which would make the ban legal and he hoped this would satisfy the requirements of the WTO.
However, Mr Fischler said he was prepared to offer compensation to the US for the loss of trade but as of now, the US had not sought compensation through the WTO.
Mr Glickman said that there had been no formal offer of compensation from the EU but the US would like compensation in the area of livestock and beef rather than trade concessions in non-agricultural areas.
Mr Glickman also defended US standards of food safety and said US consumers had faith in their regulatory bodies when they consume beef produced using hormones. He said that the EU seemed to have also rejected the offer by the US to label hormone-grown beef and Mr Fischler said that labelling would not work because the EU would not put on sale a product which could damage public health.
Mr Fischler said he was confident that the EU could convince the WTO on the matter because "our science is good".
He had not travelled to Ireland - for the World Meat Congress - to "turn up the heat" or bang on the podium.
Mr Glickman said he had come to restate his country's determination to move forward, firmly, to see the ban was lifted, ensuring that all producers are treated fairly in the global marketplace.
He claimed that with the ban in place, the US was being treated unfairly and unjustifiably and was out in the cold from a market that it was entitled to serve.
For his part, Mr Fischler said that the EU believes that the use of hormones threatens human health and this was the opinion of the Scientific Committee on Veterinary Measures.
"Given this opinion, it is quite clear that the ban on either the use of hormones within the EU or the import of beef produced using hormones cannot be lifted," Mr Fischler told the delegates.
The director of the International Policy Council on Agriculture, Food and Trade told the congress yesterday that national and international regulatory systems governing the trade in meat should be recast.
