Seal hunting has long been known as a cruel practice by animal rights activists and conservationists. Yesterday, the European Union took steps to ban seal products including “fur skins, organs, meat, oil and blubber.” An exception is made for seal products originating from indigenous people and “marketed on a not-for-profit basis”. The Environment News Service explains:
In its announcement of the new regulation, the Council said that several EU member states have adopted or intend to adopt legislation prohibiting trade in seal products, and the regulation “will harmonize rules concerning the marketing of seal products so as to avoid fragmentation and distortion of the internal market.”
For the first time, the World Trade Organization (WTO) teamed up with the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) to release a report outlining the relationship between trade and climate change. The report describes the multitude of ways in which climate change and trade intersect.
On March 13, the European Union will impose a counter-subsidy tax on U.S. biodiesel producers for “dumping” biodiesel on the European market.
European producers have been complaining about cheap imported biodiesel for quite a while, and it looks like a key European trade panel finally took action. The tax will be specific to each biodiesel producer:
ArcherDaniels Midland: 86 cents per gallon;
Cargill: 90 cents;
Imperium Renewables: 96 cents;
Green Earth Energy Fuels: 93 cents;
World Energy Alternatives: 96 cents;
Peter Cremer North America and remaining biodiesel producers will pay $1.36 per gallon.
Ensuring food safety and protecting health is one of the prime duties of every government, whether in a developed country or in a developing one. Accordingly, the WTO Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) has conferred upon every sovereign member of the WTO the right to set its own standards in the import of animal and plant products. However, the Agreement has stipulated that “the regulations should be based on science and should not arbitrarily or unjustifiably discriminate between countries where identical or similar conditions prevail.” But there are apprehensions that countries have been increasingly using these measures for trade protection by setting standards for imports that are higher than the international standards.
