Wednesday, February 1, 2017

South Dakota proposes COOL for meat

The South Dakota legislature will be debating a bill, perhaps as early as this week, to require all retailers to label meats for Country of Origin.

An organization of independent beef producers is calling for the legislation.

There is no doubt they are well aware of the impact this has on reducing prices and profits for their Canadian competitors, and that they know previous federal COOL regulations were deemed illegal by the World Trade Organization.

President Donald Trump will, no doubt, be using COOL as a bargaining chip in his demands that the North American Free Trade Agreement be renegotiated.


And for those who note that COOL was ruled illegal by the World Trade Organization, recall that Trump also said on the campaign trail that he will pull out of that global agreement if he can’t get the measures he wants to bring jobs back to the United States.