U.S. Retaliates, Will Curb Food Imports From Europe : Will Impose $100 Million in Sanctions

The United States will impose about $100 million in trade sanctions against the European Community in retaliation for the EC’s coming ban on U.S. hormone-treated beef, U.S. Trade Representative Clayton K. Yeutter said today.

The 100% tariff on such items as Danish ham, Italian canned tomatoes, beef, alcoholic beverages containing less than 7% alcohol, fruit juices and pet food will become effective at 12:01 a.m. Jan. 1, Yeutter said.

The tariffs will remain in effect as long as U.S. meat trade is interrupted due to the EC ban, Yeutter said. The value of the retaliation is about $100 million, equal to the estimated amount of lost sales opportunities for U.S. meat exporters, he said.

President Reagan decided Dec. 24, 1987, that the impending EC ban on U.S. beef was an unfair trade practice and warned that Washington would retaliate if the ban was implemented.

The EC delayed the ban for one year but decided this month to go ahead with it, saying the ban was introduced in response to pressures from consumer groups concerned about possible health risks of hormone-treated meat.

It also argued that its ban is fair because European farmers are already barred from using the hormones, which allow cattle to grow fat with less feed.

“I regret that the United States is forced to retaliate against the EC’s ban on meat treated by growth hormones,” Yeutter said.

“We have tried repeatedly to bring this issue to a scientific dispute settlement panel under the GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) in order to have it resolved,” he said. “However, our European counterparts have consistently blocked our efforts.”

The United States hopes to force the EC to back off the ban with the tough retaliatory tariffs, but the EC shows no immediate inclination to bend.

At a meeting last week, the EC foreign ministers agreed to counter the expected U.S. retaliation with additional tariffs on imports of a shopping list of U.S. products including honey, nuts, dried fruit and canned corn.

But Willy de Clercq, commissioner for external relations, said the EC is willing to have bilateral talks on the issue.

U.S. officials insist that the drugs used in slaughterhouse feed lots are safe and argued that the ban is an unfair trade barrier. An international food code committee has endorsed the use of five such growth hormones.

“Despite the EC’s claim that the animal hormone ban is based on health concerns, the EC has yet to present any evidence that proper application of the growth producing hormones in question poses any threat to human health,” Yeutter said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said daily production of hormones in humans, even in the most sensitive segment of the population, is far higher than the small amounts left in the meat of treated animals, Yeutter said.

Even untreated animals have hormone levels as high or higher than treated animals, he said.

The U.S. action does not apply to the import of European animal intestines, used to make sausage casings, because the EC is not banning imports of hormone-treated meat used to make pet foods.