UNITED STATES AND EUROPEAN UNION REACH AGREEMENT ON VETERINARY EQUIVALENCY

                                            Release No. 0143.97
                                                               
                                   Tom Amontree  (202) 720-4623
                                   Jim Petterson (202) 720-4623

UNITED STATES AND EUROPEAN UNION REACH AGREEMENT ON VETERINARY EQUIVALENCY

     Lubbock, Texas, April 30, 1997--Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman
today announced that the United States and European Union (EU) had reached
an agreement on an overall framework for recognizing as equivalent each
other's veterinary inspection systems.  

     "The progress made should open new trade opportunities for red meat,
and preserve most pre-existing trade in products such as petfood, dairy and
egg products," Glickman said.  "In those areas where we were not able to
reach full agreement, a framework now exists to resolve a number of
outstanding issues."

     This veterinary equivalency agreement covers more than $1.5 billion in
U.S. animal product exports to the EU; and an equal value of EU exports to
the U.S.

     Over the course of the talks, negotiators reached agreement on many
issues and found solutions to dozens of potential trade problems.  They
developed a "framework agreement" that provides useful elaboration of the
World Trade Organization principles on equivalency of meat inspection
standards and establishes a process for dealing with remaining and newly
emerging veterinary inspection problems.  However, negotiators were not able
to bridge all of their differences over respective approaches to poultry
meat production and inspection.  

     "It is unfortunate that we still have some unresolved issues related
to poultry processing standards," Glickman said.  "The fact that we are
losing trade in poultry is completely unacceptable.  The EU's insistence
that U.S. poultry comply with every prescriptive EU poultry regulation is
out-of-step with the EU's trade obligations.  U.S. poultry is the safest and
most wholesome in the world, and we refuse to lower our standards in order
to ship to the EU."

     The EU will continue to impose on U.S. exporters certain prescriptive
processing requirements that the U.S. does not consider to be justified on
health or scientific grounds.  As a result of the failure to reach agreement
on poultry recognition, the U.S. will begin a thorough examination of the
EU's poultry inspection system and its ability to meet tough U.S. meat
inspection rules under the new Pathogen Reduction/Hazard Analysis and
Critical Control Point (HACCP) program.  

     "We will not allow product to enter the U.S. market that does not
satisfy U.S. standards," Glickman said.  "The HACCP and pathogen reduction
rules recently adopted in the United States are the most stringent of any
country, and are aimed at reducing the incidence of such pathogens as
salmonella and E. coli to their lowest possible levels."

     The concept of equivalency ensures that while veterinary inspection
requirements may not be the same from country to country, the United States
has the right to establish its own level of public health protection.

     The two sides will continue to discuss the outstanding issues within
the context of the framework agreement.  The U.S. will continue to
aggressively pursue solutions to remaining problems.
                                
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