When you say ‘dairy’ and ‘Canada,’ the world laughsTrade lawyer Mark Warner“When you say ‘dairy’ and ‘Canada,’ the world laughs,” said Mark Warner, a trade lawyer and former official at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In the new treaty, Ottawa agreed to expand so-called tariff-rate quotas, which allow for a limited volume of American dairy products to cross into Canada without the regular tariffs. American farmers heralded the larger duty-free quota in the new North American trade agreement as a victory in their long fight against supply management. The USMCA ruling could become a template for litigation elsewhere, said Nicolas Lamp, a former dispute settlement lawyer at the World Trade Organization who now teaches trade law at Queen’s University. The USMCA ruling gives Canada until February to come up with a method of handing out quotas that doesn’t exclusively favour domestic dairy companies.

Source: National Post January 13, 2022 19:24 UTC