A year end spending bill, signed by the President Friday has ended Mandatory Country of Origin Labelling for muscle cuts of pork and beef and ground pork and beef.
A $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill, which includes repeal of provisions of Mandatory COOL pertaining to pork and beef, was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate and then signed into law by the President Friday.
Following passage the U.S. Agriculture Secretary announced, effective immediately, USDA is not enforcing the COOL requirements for beef and pork and will be amending the regulations as expeditiously as possible to reflect the change.
Senator Pat Roberts, the Chair of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, who championed repeal of COOL in the Senate, says exporters, from ranchers in Kansas to jewelry makers on the East Coast, can now breathe a sigh of relief.
I think everybody realized what was happening. This is the 4th time that the WTO has ruled. Usually, in baseball, you have 3 strikes. That’s 4 strikes for us and I knew at the outset the WTO would give the green light to both Canada and Mexico that there would be a penalty. That doesn’t auger well for a good relationship with the United States and both countries so all 3 of us have to work together to avoid that. We did precisely that. Canada will be able to export product and there will not be any segregation and then I think the United States will certainly benefit for not having any retaliation or any tariffs but also to continue the march with regards to our trade relationship. We have TPP to be considered here in this country. Trade pacts are always over sold and they’re are always over criticized. Somewhere in the middle you can reach an accord and we’ve always been very good at that with regards to the United States and Canada so we hope to continue.
Senator Roberts says every state had something to lose from keeping Mandatory COOL intact but those worries can now be put to rest.
