US organisations oppose new Farm Bill
Both Canada and Mexico complained to the World Trade Organization after being made aware of the bill, which led beef and pork organisations to fear retaliatory tariffs on not only beef and pork products, but furniture and bakery alike.
President of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association Scott George said the new bill did not benefit its members and was a “slap in the face” for the livestock industry. “We will literally use all our resources to kill this bill,” he explained.
In a teleconference, George further added that he was disappointed Congress had proposed the bill, which, according to the organisation, had come from “both sides of the aisles” and was “foundationally flawed”.
President of the Pork Producers Council Randy Spronk echoed George’s views and said costs would be huge. He added that if the farm bill was passed, solutions needed to be made to prevent retaliation and protect the industry.
Director of international trade policy at the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) Jessica Lemos said the fear of retaliation was “an unacceptable outcome” and that NAM was aligned with fellow industry bodies when it came to concern over the COOL issue.
Speaking after the teleconference, Jamie Hennigan, senior director with NAM, said: "We stand with the NCBA and NPPC in expressing our deep concern over Congress’ failure to resolve the COOL issue.
"An important opportunity to address the COOL issue in the Farm Bill was missed, but we will continue the dialogue with Capitol Hill on how to resolve this problem and will continue emphasizing the potential damage this policy could do to U.S.-manufactured exports."
Support from NFU
The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) was named as the organisation backing the proposed COOL legislation and George said it was “actively campaigning” for it to be passed.
NFU president Roger Johnson confirmed that he was “pleased with the conference report” and called for Congress to pass the bill.
He said: “We’re also very happy that the bill preserves the ability of American family farmers and ranchers to distinguish their products in the marketplace through the existing country-of-origin labelling (COOL) law.”
According to a study carried out by Kansas State, consumers claim to want COOL when asked, but care more about the look and price of the meat than the origin labelling when it comes to purchasing it.
