EU Says new Anti-Hormone Directive is WTO Compliant

BRUSSELS - Oct 15/03 - SNS -- European Union officials say their latest directive controlling use of growth hormones in livestock is based on proper research and is therefore compliant with World Trade Organization (WTO) rulings which allowed Canada and the United States to impose countervailing duties.

Officials said the directive implements the recommendations of the WTO ruling condemning the EU for banning the use of certain growth promoting hormones without a state of the art scientific risk assessment of the risk associated with meat consumption.

Following the WTO Appellate Body decision in 1998, the EU carried out a thorough and careful appraisal of the scientific evidence available, on the basis of which the Council and the European Parliament have adopted the new Directive.

EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy said: "Today's move shows that we are fully committed to abiding by our WTO obligations. We have worked hard to get this new legislation in place and I now call on the United States and Canada to lift their trade sanctions against the EU".

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