Trade ministers from the World Trade Organization’s 164 member countries can agree on at least one basic thing about the WTO’s dispute settlement process: they’re still committed to fixing the broken system for resolving trade disputes. Beyond that, there were few signs of progress as trade representatives, including Canada’s Mary Ng and the United States’… Read More
Tag: World Trade Organization
The Canadian government is planning to file another request for the World Trade Organization to establish a dispute settlement panel to look at China’s restrictions on Canadian canola seed imports. China used a procedural tactic to block Canada’s initial appeal for a dispute panel at the WTO Dispute Settlement Body’s monthly meeting on Monday (June… Read More
With the World Trade Organization’s dispute settlement process in tatters, Canada is among a group of 23 WTO members that are trying to apply a band-aid solution for settling trade disputes amongst themselves. The group, which also includes Australia, China, the European Union, and Mexico, announced on Monday (August 3) that its temporary arrangement is… Read More
Canada and nearly two dozen other members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) are urging global leaders to avoid taking measures that adversely affect trade of agriculture products while responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. The group, which includes the European Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States, issued a joint statement on Canada’s request… Read More
A group of self described ‘like-minded’ World Trade Organization (WTO) members met in Ottawa this week. The WTO reform was hosted by Jim Carr, minister of international trade diversification for Canada. Not included in this ‘like-minded’ group was Canada’s closest neighbour and largest trading partner, the U.S. China also not included. The meeting, which took… Read More
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) recently released its report on the 19th case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), concluding the likely cause was contamination of feed on-farm. “The carry-over of a small amount of residual contaminated feed associated with an earlier case (17) on the same birth farm is the most plausible explanation for… Read More
A fourth and final decision from the World Trade Organization on U.S. mandatory country of origin labeling (COOL) rules will be announced in the next few days. The WTO has said its decision on the Americans’ latest appeal to maintain COOL will be shared with members no later than May 18th. Another ruling in Canada and Mexico’s favour would… Read More
Today, the United States officially lodged an appeal to the third and most recent World Trade Organization ruling on Country of Origin Labelling (COOL). Canadian Ministers are not pleased with the announced appeal. The Honourable Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade and the Honourable Gerry Ritz, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food issued the following statement… Read More