Philippines Asks for Rice QRs at WTO, US wants Access to Pork Market in Return for Ok on QR

A bid by the Philippines to extend special treatment on rice imports at the WTO is being blocked by the US over health and safety standards for frozen meat, the Filipino agriculture minister claimed last Thursday. The two sides met on 29 February in the Philippines in an attempt to resolve the row.

Arguing that the country’s limits on annual rice import volumes are crucial to protecting the livelihoods of millions of poor farmers, Manila is negotiating to prolong exceptional arrangements allowing it to maintain ‘quantitative restrictions’ on the staple for another five to seven years.

In the WTO committee that deals with food safety, the US has called for AO 22 Philippines meat standard to be suspended, claiming that because its traceability, packaging, and labelling requirements do not apply to fresh meat that is mainly produced domestically, the measure appears to discriminate against imported frozen meat.

Canada - which alone accounts for over half of Filipino pork imports - has said that there is no scientific rationale for imposing different food safety measures on fresh and frozen meat, an argument that has also been made by the EU.