Brazil sues the EU at the WTO because of barriers on poultry meat

Last Monday, Brazil filed a formal dispute against the European Union (EU) at the World Trade Organization (WTO) because of barriers preventing Brazilian poultry meat from entering the bloc’s 27 countries.

The Brazilian government had made this threat for a long time, but it only made this decision now, days after a trip to Brasília by the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell. The diplomat’s visit to the country was seen as a resumption of bilateral relations at a higher level.

Brazil triggered the WTO dispute settlement mechanism based on the argument that the European Union imposes “discriminatory sanitary controls for the detection of salmonella in salted chicken meat and peppered turkey”.

The Brazilian government claims that there is no technical or scientific evidence to justify the European Union’s application of stricter microbiological criteria to detect salmonella in salted chicken meat and peppered turkey than on fresh poultry meat. The government states that by imposing “these discriminatory criteria, the European Union acts outside the rules of the Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures of the World Trade Organization and creates unjustified barriers to international trade”.

Even so, Itamaraty stated, in a statement, that it believes in a “friendly solution to the imbroglio with the Europeans. “Brazil hopes to receive a response from the European Union to this request and reach an agreement on a mutually convenient date for consultations to resolve this controversy,” says a document signed by the Brazilian ambassador to the World Trade Organization, Alexandre Parola.

Source: Valor Econômico

To read the full original article, access the link: https://valor.globo.com/agronegocios/noticia/2021/11/09/brasil-aciona-a-ue-na-omc-por-causa-de-travas- a-poultry-meat.ghtml

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