US, EU question RP meat import rules

Top officials of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and at least 11 embassies of the European Union (EU) in Manila are planning to lodge a protest against two government regulations that could have a major impact on their meat exports to the Philippines.

Industry sources said the USDA, representing US meat exporters and EU meat suppliers to the Philippines, are meeting this week to come up with a unified position on Administrative Order 39 (AO 39) of the Department of Agriculture (DA), and the recently-legislated Meat Inspection Code of the Philippines (MICP).

These two laws that govern meat importation have caught the attention of international meat suppliers to the country because it redounds to imposing more stringent requirements on top of the already rigid process that exporters are currently dealing with, said a source from one of the country’s major meat processing companies.

Meat exporters from the US, Australia, New Zealand and Spain, were some of those who attended a public hearing on meat importation last week held at the DA compound in Quezon City.

During the hearing, meat exporters echoed the sentiments of the Philippine Association of Meat Processors (PAMPI) which clamored for the DA to amend AO 39 since they claimed it is being used as a quantitative restriction to control their business.

PAMPI which was not invited to the public hearing, said AO 39 requires its members to secure a veterinary quarantine clearance (VQC) before they are allowed to import their carabeef or Indian buffalo meat requirements.

The group said the current system where the VQC is effectively used as an import permit, violates Section 3, Article 2 of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on the application of sanitary and phytosanitary measures which states that "sanitary and phytosanitary measures shall not be applied in manner which would constitute a disguised restriction in international trade."

PAMPI said that its trading partners such as the US or EU members, do not require their companies to secure quarantine import permits from their respective agencies to import agricultural goods from the Philippines.

Earlier, the private sector-led Agriculture and Food Suppliers Association (AFSA) said Section 54 of the MICP violates international trade rules set by the WTO and exposes the Philippines to retaliatory measures by its trading partners.

Section 54 states that itís unlawful for any shipping line or airline to accept shipment of meat and meat products for export to the Philippines without securing a VQC issued by the DA and the International Veterinary Certificate issued by the national controlling authority of the exporting country.

Maritess Concepcion, AFSA president, said that requiring meat importers to secure two sets of VQCs, one from the exporting country and one from the Philippines is unnecessary.

"This is not necessary because all importers of meat and meat products from DA-accredited countries of origin or establishments have already been pre-approved and pre-cleared under existing multilateral or bilateral agreements, or accreditation procedures. Instead of facilitating trade, it amounts to a de factor import control, a non-tariff barrier with VQC as the control mechanism," she said.