WRITTEN QUESTION P-0590/98 by Sirkka-Liisa Anttila (ELDR) to the Commission (23 February 1998)

Subject: Fundamental differences in food hygiene testing between the USA's 'decontamination' approach and the EU's 'from the field to the table' approach

Negotiations are in progress between the United States and the European Union concerning the preconditions for signing a veterinary and animal health agreement. The methods used to protect consumers' health are based on fundamentally different principles in the USA and the EU. In the USA, only the final product is tested, whereas in the EU consumers are protected effectively by monitoring the whole production chain 'from the field to the table'. Large quantities of antibiotics and hormones are used in high-productivity industrial-style livestock farming in the USA to increase efficiency. Meanwhile in the EU extensive agricultural production is being invested in, which accords with environmental, animal welfare and sustainable development objectives, together with checks throughout the food production chain, all of which of course entails extra costs.

According to the information at my disposal, the Commission considers it important to conclude the Veterinary Agreement between the USA and the EU. Why? Ought not the EU to safeguard its own consumers' health by ensuring that imported foodstuffs sold within the EU meet the same high quality, hygiene and veterinary standards which we require of food produced within the EU? Commissioner Fischler has spoken persuasively of the high quality of food and of safeguarding consumers' health. Is it not now the Commission's duty to defend the production standards for which the EU has opted and our own comprehensive monitoring system? This will have implications for whether the EU's principles of consumer and environmental protection can be asserted in the next round of WTO negotiations in 1999. If the Commission now approves the Veterinary Agreement, we shall forfeit the opportunity to defend the EU's systems for monitoring the production of quality foodstuffs 'from the field to the table'.

Will the Commission insist that the EU's trade partners, such as the USA, adopt food hygiene and quality monitoring systems as comprehensive as the EU's?

Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission (30 March 1998)

Since the Commission started making inspections of meat-exporting establishments in the United States in the mid 1980s, trade difficulties have arisen because of the differences in approach to health measures adopted by the Community and the United States. In order to overcome these trade problems, an agreement (the 'red meat agreement') was negotiated in the early 1990s and adopted by the Council in October 1992 by Council Decision 93/158/EEC ((OJ L 68, 19.3.1993. )). This recognized that the regulatory systems of both parties basically provide equivalent safeguards against public health risks. It set out the technical solutions needed to allow trade to continue and concluded that the two parties would initiate discussions as soon as possible on other problems in the veterinary field in relation to trade in animals and products of animal origin.

Further impetus was given to these discussions by the entry into force on 1 January 1995 of the World trade organisation (WTO) agreement on the application of sanitary and phytosanitary measures (the SPS agreement), which provides, in Article 4, that members shall accept the sanitary measures of other members as equivalent, even if those measures differ from their own, if the exporting member objectively demonstrates to the importing member that its measures achieve the importing member's appropriate level of sanitary protection. This article also requires members, upon request, to enter into consultations with the aim of achieving bilateral and multilateral agreements on recognition of the equivalence of sanitary measures.

The draft agreement between the United States and the Community, which the Commission has sent to the Council ((COM(97) 566 final. )) and to which the Honourable Member refers, covers sanitary measures affecting trade in certain animals and animal products. Measures related to drug residues (e.g. hormones and antibiotics) are at present excluded from the scope of the draft agreement. The effect of this is that these matters remain subject to the legislation of each party in respect of trade.

The purpose of the draft agreement is to facilitate trade between the parties in live animals and animal products by establishing a mechanism for the recognition of equivalence of sanitary measures where this is possible, and establishing a framework for working towards equivalence in other areas. For each party, equivalence can only be accepted in cases where the party is satisfied that the agreed conditions of trade meet its chosen level of sanitary protection. In all cases, it is the right of the importing party to determine if the measures of the exporting party meet its level of protection. The rights of parties under the WTO agreements are not affected by the provisions of the draft agreement, but the intention of the draft agreement is to work towards mutually acceptable solutions instead of allowing damaging trade disputes to develop.

Provisions are included for the exchange of information on matters relating to the draft agreement, including specific provisions on the notification to each other of outbreaks of disease. A safeguard clause is also included, allowing parties to take unilateral emergency measures to protect human or animal health.

It should be stressed that nothing in this draft agreement changes basic Community legislation. Any such change would have to be made by the Council and Parliament on the basis of Article 100A of the EC Treaty.

In the Council meeting on 16 and 17 March 1998 the agreement was adopted unanimously with procedural safeguards concerning the signature of the agreement.