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The EU business delegation that left for Canada this week, led by Agriculture Commissioner Phil Hogan, had high hopes of doing business with the country. From a beef and dairy perspective, it was a case of adding a new useful market rather than a game changer. However, moving from a 26% tariff to zero is bound to make a difference.
The Commissioner began the Toronto leg of his visit by calling at the Ireland famine memorial. Appropriately, he mentioned ahead of the official dinner that this month 170 years ago, the first of 38,000 refugees that would land arrived from Ireland. This was at a time when Toronto’s population was just 20,000 and he finished the point by asking what is food security worth?
Issues
The issues EU farmers have with giving market access to Canada have been well documented, but this mission revealed that Canadian farmers have their own issues too. They cannot understand the EU not allowing imports of beef that has been washed with citric acid – lemon and vinegar as the president of the Cattlemen’s Association described it. He considers product not treated in this way as being a higher risk to consumers, yet Canada is prepared to accept it.
Listen to Commissioner Hogan in our podcast below:
Listen to "Hogan in Canada" on Spreaker.
While Brexit hangs over the Irish agriculture industry and presents the biggest threat in a generation, Canadian business is finding the trade policy of President Trump “nerve-wracking” as explained by Joy Nott, president of the Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters. She compared CETA with NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement that was concluded in the mid 1990s.
Modern agreement
Nott believes CETA is everything it should be, a modern 21st century agreement that reflects the digital age of communication that wasn’t around when NAFTA was negotiated. John Clarke, the head of international trade in DG Agri, also gave a powerful endorsement of CETA, highlighting that it was not just about agriculture, but gives Canada access to a 500m population in Europe. He referenced the benefit of negotiating with the EU as a single entity for Canada.
The trade deal with Canada no doubt brings risk, as it gives access to the EU market for potentially 50,000t of beef and a similar amount of pork, while the EU and Ireland has unlimited access to Canada.
The negative view is that the EU market is saturated and has no room to take in more beef. Yet the view in Canada is that the requirement of no acid washing (more than hormone-free beef) makes the EU a very unattractive market anyway.
Only time will reveal whether Canada is a threat or an opportunity for Irish farmers. However, given that Ireland desperately needs to develop new markets in view of Brexit and growing cattle population, risks will have to be taken, and trade embraced.
Listen: Canadian beef farmers unhappy with CETA
Cheese quota creates stumbling block for CETA
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