June 25, 2007

Canada urges South Korea to eliminate beef tariffs in fifteen years

Canada seeks to discuss the issue on tariffs with South Korea on sensitive agricultural products, including eliminating the duties on beef in the resumption of free trade agreement (FTA) between the two nations.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MOFAT) disclosed Friday (June 22) that practical talks on industrial sectors for the Korea-Canada FTA will be conducted from June 25 to 28 in Ottawa, Canada.

The two countries have already held ten negotiation discussions since July 2005 to April this year, but decided to conduct technical talks -- only concentrating on industrial tariff concession plans instead of carrying out the originally scheduled 11th round of talks -- after judging that talks on the abolishment timing of industrial tariffs were insufficient.

The next tariff negotiations will include sensitive agricultural goods such as beef, pork, soybeans, potatoes, cars and textiles.

A Korean trade official said Canada is asking Korea for a tariff abolishment standard similar to that of the US, i.e. elimination of beef tariffs in 15 years but South Korea is to stick to its original position, intricate in accepting the requests.

However, Canada insists its beef is in direct competition with US beef and it would be unfair for Canadian beef to bear higher tariffs than the US's.