Canada seeks ‘coalition of the willing’ on Asian trade, post TPP, says Champagne
OTTAWA Canada is searching for a new “coalition of the willing” to forge trade links in Asia following President Donald Trump’s decision to kill the Trans-Pacific Partnership, says the new Liberal trade minister.
Trump followed through on his promise to pull the U.S. out of the 12-country Pacific Rim pact in the days after his inauguration last month, a decision that has effectively killed the TPP.
The sweeping trade deal in goods would have accounted for 40 per cent of the global economy and included several Asian and Western Hemisphere countries, Canada among them.
But now it is back to the drawing board because the TPP can only be ratified if six countries, totalling 85 per cent of the deal’s combined GDP, approve the deal.
Only the U.S. and Japan had the sole power to veto the TPP because of the size of their economies.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had been hoping to persuade Trump to change his mind, but that now appears futile. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke by phone with Abe on Wednesday and their conversation suggested the possibility of pursing a separate deal between the two countries.
“The leaders discussed the importance of deepening trade links between Canada and Japan and developing the untapped potential in the bilateral relationship,” Trudeau's office said.
That’s significant, because Japan has steadfastly refused for years to restart bilateral free trade talks with Canada, saying the TPP would serve the same purpose as a country-to-country agreement.
Irradiation is already used in Canada to treat potatoes, onions, wheat, flour, spices and some seasonings.
Mark Klassen, a spokesman for the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association, said it’s good news for consumers and beef producers.
“It is essentially an extra food safety measure. When you add it to all of the other things that we do today ... it could essentially eliminate illness from E. coli 0157,” he said from Strathmore, Alta.
“We are serving hundreds of millions of beef servings. If we can go from a few cases of E. coli 0157 to none — that is where we want to be as an industry.”
Klassen compared the health benefits of irradiated beef to the effect of milk pasteurization at the beginning of the last century.
The association renewed its call for beef irradiation following an extensive recall of beef products during the fall of 2012. E. coli linked to a former XL Foods plant in Alberta sickened 18 people in British Columbia, Quebec, Alberta and Newfoundland and Labrador.
Klassen said it will take about a year for the industry to provide irradiated ground beef to consumers. Supply will depend on demand.
The association represents 68,500 beef farms and feedlots mainly in Western Canada.
Health Canada said irradiated ground beef retains its nutritional value, taste, texture and appearance.
The department said it will consider requests to allow for the sale of other irradiated meat products based on the same review rules it used for ground beef.