U.S.-South Korea free trade agreement does not include beef; Senate Finance Committee Chair vows to block approval

Food & Drink Weekly, April 9, 2007

The United States will continue pressuring South Korea to lift restrictive safety measures that block U.S. beef exports before a separate free trade agreement (FTA) is signed by the White House and sent to Congress for ratification, a USDA spokeswoman said last week.

The goal, Terri Teuber said, is to get a "clear path forward" to resume beef trade before President Bush signs the free trade agreement, because U.S. lawmakers aren't likely to ratify the trade agreement if South Korea continues to block U.S. beef out of concerns over mad-cow disease.

Dow Jones Newswires reports that Bush administration officials had been hoping to get South Korea to free up beef trade by March 30, the deadline for a trade deal to be reached, but that did not happen.

Gregg Doud, chief economist for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, said the group won't support the trade agreement until "commercially viable beef trade is occurring" between the U.S. and South Korea. That is the message, the NCBA will take to lawmakers in Congress, Doud said.

The American Meat Institute, a group representing most U.S. packers and processors, said its members "will not be satisfied until the Korean market is unconditionally open to U.S. beef, and until then, we agree with the Bush administration that it should not submit the Free Trade Agreement for congressional consideration."

Meanwhile, Dow Jones Newswires also reports that the South Korea FTA won't get a vote in Congress unless Seoul lifts a ban on U.S. beef imports, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said last week. "Negotiators instead made vague promises to resolve this issue at some point in the future," Baucus said in a press statement. "The trade agreement will not move forward in the U.S. Senate until they do."

"This is an entirely unacceptable outcome," said Baucus, whose committee has jurisdiction over trade law. "I will oppose the Korea Free Trade Agreement, and in fact I will not allow it to move through the Senate, unless and until Korea completely lifts its ban on U.S. beef."

However, there may be hope for the future of U.S./Korea beef trade as it appears that some headway also was made on this issue. "Korea and the U.S. have already reached a verbal consensus in which Korea will soften its beef quarantine rules in several months," said public health veterinarian Park Sang-pyo. That action is expected to come when the International Organization for Animal Health (OIE) formally adopts a shift in the status of the United States relative to mad cow disease.

As for the other provisions of the FTA, South Korean officials were able to persuade their U.S. counterparts to exclude trade in rice from the deal, a move observers say will allow Korea to open its market more slowly to this grain, which is a key food staple in the country and a politically sensitive item. The United States had sought to include rice in the deal, seeking access to the South Korean market.