It’s been many, many years since I was foolish enough to think I might have all the answers. In this space, be prepared to see me asking questions. At the very least — though I’ve also long since given up the idea of ever appearing on Jeopardy! — my responses will often be in the form of questions.
Today, for instance, everything I’ve been reading about the U.S. government’s latest rules on food product labelling — the so-called v-COOL, or voluntary country-of-origin labelling law — raises more questions than answers.
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We can’t talk about v-COOL from a Canadian perspective without first talking about its late, unlamented predecessor m-COOL (“m” for “mandatory”), so let’s set up that background. First developed in Bill Clinton’s administration, the m-COOL law meandered rather half-heartedly through the George W. Bush administration toward passage in 2008, and was put into effect during the Obama administration in 2009. That law imposed mandatory and very specific origin labels on beef, pork, lamb, chicken and goat meat and certain other perishables where sold at retail in the U.S.
We spent a lot of time writing about m-COOL online during those years and would receive the occasional comment from readers south of the border, asking if Canadian ranchers were “afraid of competition.” I so wanted to ask those commenters whether they somehow really believed that was ever Canada’s problem with m-COOL, or were just trolling us — but I had better things to do.
So we’re clear, Canada’s very real problem with Washington’s m-COOL law was that the law, as enforced by the Obama administration, was anti-competitive — forcing U.S. packers to provide a level of detail on meat labels which compelled them, at significant added cost, to segregate incoming animals at slaughter to meet the law’s requirements, essentially building a non-tariff trade barrier against Canadian livestock. Canada and Mexico, quite rightly, launched the long, tedious process of challenging m-COOL at the World Trade Organization — and, also quite rightly, won, in 2015.
With that trainwreck in the rear-view mirror, no one can fault Canada’s government, Canada’s livestock groups or the U.S. meatpacking sector for being suspicious of the Biden administration’s motives for the new v-COOL rule, published a year ago last month and finalized a few weeks ago to come into force starting in 2026.
The difference is that v-COOL will impose requirements on U.S. packers and processors who choose to use the terms “Product of USA” or “Made in the USA,” rather than on all U.S. packers and processors. As the U.S. Department of Agriculture puts it, the v-COOL rule allows those exact claims on meat, poultry and egg products “only when they are derived from animals born, raised, slaughtered and processed in the United States. The rule will prohibit misleading U.S. origin labeling in the market, and help ensure that the information that consumers receive about where their food comes from is truthful.”
Past that, any packer or processor whose labels make other voluntary U.S. origin claims besides those would need to include a description on the package of “all preparation and processing steps that occurred in the United States upon which the claim is made.”
So, U.S. packers and processors have almost two years to decide what’s more important to them: being able to make those very specific label claims of U.S. provenance on their packaging, or being able to import meat or livestock as needed, when needed.
From the Canadian government’s perspective, though, the Canadian and U.S. meat and livestock sectors are “highly integrated,” and — as the federal ag and trade ministers said jointly a few weeks ago, they’re “disappointed that the final (v-COOL) rule does not appear to take into account the concerns we have continually brought forward related to our unique and important trading relationship.” They also say they’ll “closely monitor its impacts and implementation, including in light of the U.S.’ international trade obligations.”
Or what? Well, the North American Meat Institute last year went so far as to point out that Canada, after winning its m-COOL case, still has WTO authorization to set up retaliatory tariffs against any U.S. label law that uses the same standard as mandatory COOL “with no further action by the WTO.” NAMI, a U.S. lobby group for beef, pork, lamb, veal and turkey packers and processors, argues that the v-COOL law comes with “no evidence this rule will increase already high consumer demand for meat and poultry products.”
Was that the point, though? Or is the U.S. label law this time actually about truth in packaging, as USDA claims?
We can talk about an integrated North American livestock market until the cows come home, so to speak, but here’s the question for you, the Prairie farmer and/or rancher: would you, as a consumer, expect a label that says “Product of Canada” or “Made in Canada” to contain product shipped in from across the NAFTA region — or strictly from animals born, raised, slaughtered and processed in Canada?
Come to think of it, that’s not even a hypothetical question up here.
Yes, Canada already has its own guidelines about packers’ and processors’ voluntary use of the terms “Product of Canada,” “Made in Canada,” and “100% Canadian” on their labels — that is, if they want to adhere to sections of the federal Food and Drugs Act and Safe Food for Canadians Act that ban “false and misleading claims.”
For meat, specifically, a “Product of Canada” label can be applied to “meat from Canadian animals that are slaughtered in Canada.” Under that guidance, “animals are considered Canadian if they are born or hatched, raised and slaughtered in Canada or, in the case of feeder cattle, if they have spent a period of at least 60 days in Canada prior to slaughter in Canada.”
With that in mind: should Canada still be prepared to fire its WTO-approved tariff arrow over U.S. v-COOL, if NAMI or any other lobby group asks us to do so?
Enough questions for today — other than to ask that you drop me a line with your thoughts on the matter.
