The U.S. Department of Agriculture has decided to review changes to the country-of-origin labelling regulations, announced earlier this month.
The decision is part of a larger strategy by president Barack Obama, who shortly after his inauguration Jan. 20, released a memo that put a freeze on all regulations proposed in the final days of the George Bush presidency.
As a result, the new U.S. agriculture secretary, Tom Vilsack, announced Jan. 21 that he would “conduct a thorough review” of all pending regulations, including the COOL final rule, which was scheduled to become law March 16.
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The decision threatens wording changes to the final rule that federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz, only two weeks ago, described as a victory for Canada’s livestock producers.
“There are provisions (in the final rule) that recognize the reality that North America’s livestock industry is closely integrated and interdependent,” Ritz said in a teleconference with reporters Jan. 13.
In that same teleconference, Ritz was asked if he had concerns that Obama, then president-elect, would endorse the changes to the COOL regulations.
“I don’t feel that’s going to change (things). Governments come and go but bureaucracies tend to stay in place,” Ritz answered, noting that he would call Vilsack, “to reinforce that they’re on the right track with these changes to COOL.”
Following the USDA’s announcement of the review, Ritz remained encouraged that Obama, Vilsack and others will adopt the COOL changes.
“It was totally expected that something like that would happen,” Ritz said at a news conference in Ottawa Jan. 23.
“Any incoming president wants to put his own stamp … on any of these types of things. He is getting pressure internally to maintain the strictness of the COOL rules, but at the same time, I see voices of reason like Mike Johanns, as you know, was the former secretary of agriculture, saying we need to foster trade …. At the end of the day, we’ll hope that cooler heads prevail, but we’re in a 60 day hiatus at this point while president Obama and his team review this.”
The USDA’s changes to the final rule, released Jan. 12, included wording that gave packers more flexibility in processing B livestock, animals born in Canada but fed in the U.S., and category C livestock, animals exported directly from Canada for slaughter.
Based on most interpretations of the wording, it would have allowed packers to commingle B and C livestock, but maintain a Product of USA-Canada label.
In contrast to Ritz’s optimism that this is simply a bump on the road, Martin Rice, executive director of the Canadian Pork Council, is concerned about the loss of certainty.
“The sooner the rule was finalized, the sooner we knew the conditions,” he said, noting this freeze extends the period of unknown trade rules. “I guess we’re looking at 60 days (for the review). I hope we’re not looking at any more than that.”
