Manitoba Frustrated Not Surprised by US ITC Ruling on Canadian Hogs
Farmscape for May 10, 2004 (Episode 1512) Manitoba's Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Initiatives says a US decision to proceed with investigations into imported Canadian butcher hogs and weanling pigs is frustrating but not surprising. On Friday, in a unanimous 6-0 decision, the US International Trade Commission determined there is a reasonable indication of injury to US pork producers from unfairly traded hogs imported from Canada. The preliminary finding clears the way for the trade commission and the US Department of Commerce to proceed with investigations of complaints filed by US pork producers. Rosann Wowchuk says, given previous experience with this type of US trade action, the ITC decision was not unexpected. Clip-Rosann Wowchuk-Manitoba Agriculture Minister We have been working very closely with the producers on this one. We have legal council representing us in Washington as part of the Canadian team. We think it is a frivolous challenge and, quite frankly, we're quite frustrated by the number of frivolous challenges we have had here. There have been nine challenges on the wheat board, all of those have been ruled in our favor and we believe this one will go the same way. They are challenging our programs and, whenever we develop programs, we work very closely to ensure we are not in violation of the trade agreements. It's quite frustrating to continue to get these challenges when we have a very integrated market. The US producers want free trade but they continue to use these challenges to disrupt trade. Wowchuk points out, while the ITC ruling allows the countervail and antidumping investigations to proceed, it does not result in any immediate duties being applied to Canadian hogs. For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane. *Farmscape is a presentation of Sask Pork and Manitoba Pork Council