U.S. trade panel defies NAFTA, rules Canadian lumber injures U.S. produc

[CHIMO]

WASHINGTON - Canadian softwood lumber imports pose a threat of injury to U.S. lumber producers, the U.S. International Trade Commission reaffirmed Friday in renewed defiance of a NAFTA panel ruling.

"Time and time again, both the NAFTA panel and the WTO have found no evidence of injury ? or even threat of injury ? to the American industry," he said.
The World Trade Organisation, too, has found no evidence that Canadian imports hurt the U.S. lumber industry.

http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/06/11/canada/soft040611

Seems like a good election issue, espically since Kerry would like to revisit NAFTA.

[UpInArms]

1. wonder what those

"free traders" are doing right now?

:wishingtherewasashittingpantsicon:

[Kagemusha]

2. Well do they hurt or don't they?

And I don't mean in the sense that the fact there's competition at all hurts.

On the Canadian side I've heard complaints that they signed these treaties because they kept winning on this issue again and again and the US simply ignored the rulings and defied any semblance of obeying international law or arbitration (kind of like the Geneva Conventions).

[CharlesGroce]

3. revisiting isn't

revoking. NAFTA and the WTO are evil and need to be out of the American political establishment.

[achtung_circus]

4. the price of a new home in the US is about $5,000 more than it would be

if Canadian lumber were allowed in again. The American mills, and especially the southern m,ills, are making a killing. The mills in the Pacific Northwest had no problem with the competition. The southern yellow pine produced in Georgia, for example, is of lower quality than the Canadian Spruce, warps more easily and costs the American public more.

BC has been devastated, towns are dying.

How about the Canadian Wheat Board dispute. The US has lost trade panel after trade panel; over this one, yearly for at least the last decade. They don't like the fact that Canadian grain is marketed co-operatively (and effectively). After losing each panel, they change the terms of reference a little and resubmit the complaint to the US department of Commerce.

How about beef. The American consumer is paying huge dollars for American beef, because the border remains closed after BSE, in defiance of scientific evidence. How about Country of Origin Labeling (COOL). There is a strong support among the American meat industry for COOL, generally phrased as a food safety issue.

The American farmer has a phrase for the huge subsidies provided by their governments. They call it "farming the mailbox".

Free trade my Royal Canadian Ass.