Canada threatens WTO complaint for China pork ban

The Canadian government has threatened to file a complaint with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) if China fails to lift a ban on pork from the Canadian province of Alberta, where a herd of pigs tested positive for the H1N1 flu virus.

 

"Should China continue on, of course there is the WTO challenge, which we would not hesitate to enact," Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz told the House of Commons on Monday (May 4).

 

Beijing has imposed an import ban on pigs and pork products from Alberta in response to the virus being found in some 200 animals.

 

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency insisted Canadian pork was still safe, and that the animals had likely contracted the disease from a Canadian who had recently returned from Mexico.

 

"China is operating outside of sound science," Ritz insisted, noting that Beijing has received safety assurances from the World Health Organization, or WHO, and the World Organisation for Animal Health, or OIE.

 

The WHO's representative in China said Monday that the measure against Alberta pork was probably redundant, since the feared virus isn't transmitted through pigs or pork products, but from human to human.

 

The biggest concern surrounding live pigs is their possible role in harbouring human, avian and swine flu viruses and enabling them to mix into new types, according to health experts.

 

The new A/H1N1 influenza, which appeared in Mexico and the US over the past month and sent the world into a pandemic alert, is a mixture of all three. Health experts are still trying to track down its origins.

 

Ritz said he had spoken to China's ambassador to Ottawa, Lan Lijun, to give assurances of the safety of Canadian pork.

 

"We will continue to stand up for Canadian pork producers and ensure that they are treated fairly by China and all members of the World Trade Organisation," he said in a statement.

 

"I have spoken to American Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to make our American neighbours aware of the situation. He has assured me that Canadian hog producers will continue to have access to the American market," he added.

 

China last week banned pork imports from Mexico and the US states of Texas, Kansas and California.

 

China, the world's largest consumer of pork, has so far not reported any confirmed or even probable cases of swine flu.

 

The WHO and three other international organisations on Saturday (May 2) denounced boycotts of pork over fears the meat could be a means of spreading the A/H1N1 virus, saying there was no evidence it was a source of infection.

 

"To date there is no evidence that the virus is transmitted by food," the WHO, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, the World Trade Organisation and the World Organisation for Animal Health said in a statement.