reLAKSation 282. Callander McDowell
Playing fair: EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson recently attended a conference in Oslo but refused to use the opportunity to discuss the removal of the trade barriers on Norwegian salmon. According to IntraFish, Mr Mandelson claimed that it was now a matter for the WTO to address and appeared to make light of the whole problem. Of course, had Mr Mandelson been previously willing to discuss the issue, Norway would have never needed to approach the WTO at all. Sadly, Mr Mandelson has repeatedly refused to listen to reason and thus the issue has yet to be resolved.
Mr Mandeslon is not the only British person working in Europe to have adopted a blinkered view of the salmon issue. The Glasgow Herald reported that David Martin MEP had warned that thousands of jobs in the Scottish salmon industry are threatened by a coalition of European member states, including Italy, Portugal, Lithuania, Poland and Spain that wants the removal of the Minimum Import Price. Mr Martin believes that the reason that this coalition has demanded the repeal of the MIP is that the UK did not support their request for trade measures against shoe imports from Asia and that they are trying to retaliate by taking it out on Scottish farmers. Mr Martin argues that the two cases are unrelated. He also suggests that the request for measures to protect the shoe industry is based on flimsy evidence whereas the evidence showing that Norway had sold salmon under the cost of production was compelling.
Of course, whether
the evidence is adjudged to be flimsy or compelling depends on ones’ specific
allegiance. As a senior Scottish MEP, Mr Martin’s loyalty is without question,
however the truth of the matter is that the evidence within the EUSPG dumping
submission was just as flimsy as that of the shoe case, if not more so. The
EUSPG submission was significantly flawed and should have been rejected by DG
Trades complaints department during their initial evaluation. The reason why it
was accepted without proper evaluation as required under WTO rules was because
DG Trade had already concluded that Norway was guilty of dumping. This was
because the dumping case was run in parallel to, but slightly behind, the
application for safeguards submitted by the DTI. This application did not
require such initial evaluation for accuracy and thus proceeded straight to
investigation.
The fact that the dumping submission (made by only 18% of the Scottish industry,
but a higher percentage of Scottish owned companies) contains some major
discrepancies is apparent if the data from the safeguard application is compared
with that from the dumping submission for the exact same time period. If the
information contained in the safeguard application is deemed to be correct, then
that in the dumping submission is clearly not, thus invalidating the original
submission, the subsequent investigation, as well as the disputed trade
measures.
Members of the DG Trade investigation team have accepted that there are some
errors in the submission but claim as the investigation has shown that dumping
occurred then these inaccuracies are irrelevant. What they fail to see is that
if the submission had been evaluated properly, then there would have been no
investigation and thus no such conclusion.
David Martin MEP also said that whilst he strongly supports free trade he
believes in fair trade. He argues that if Norway wants to export salmon into the
EU it must play by the rules but surely, this must also apply to both sides. The
EUSPG knew that a straight forward dumping submission would never be accepted
because it would have been rejected outright. They thus persuaded the Scottish
Executive to support an application for safeguards as they knew that a safeguard
case would go to investigation immediately without prior evaluation. As soon as
the first conclusions were announced, the EUSPG then submitted their dumping
case and it got pushed through on the back of the safeguard case. DG Trade have
admitted that this is very unusual and cannot cite even one other example of
such parallel actions involving the same dispute. This was not playing fair as
it led to a situation where DG Trade threatened Norway with a choice of either
safeguard or dumping measures without any opportunity to prove their innocence.
DG Trade will say that Norway is guilty as all their previous investigations
have led to the same conclusion, yet if they were to conduct a similar
investigation of the Scottish industry, they would reach a similar conclusion
too. This is because the very nature of the salmon life cycle leads to the
appearance of what seems to be dumping margins in the farming process. These
dumping margins are a natural artefact of salmon farming and the methodology of
the dumping investigations.
The removal of the MIP will not lead to the loss of thousands of jobs as Mr
Martin claims but will instead encourage further investment. Sid Patten of the
SSPO believes that Scottish salmon production will eventually reach 200,000
tonnes a year but this will only come with further investment, yet why would
anyone want to invest in an industry subjected to EU trade measures?
The EUSPG claim that dumping has been brought about by massive
over-production of salmon in Norway. Against a background of declining wild
caught fisheries throughout the world and growing demand for fish and seafood,
how can any aquaculture industry be guilty of over-production? The industry
needs to be producing much more fish in order to remove the fishing pressure of
depleted stocks and provide consumers with a sustainable and viable alternative.
The MIP sends out a completely different message and should be removed as soon
as possible.
Where is the organic fish?: An IntraFish editorial poses the question as to where the organic fish and seafood in British supermarkets? It seems that whilst most of the shelves are groaning under the weight of organic products, organic fish and seafood is conspicuous by its absence.
IntraFish report that whilst chilled prepacked fish are generally well-presented in UK supermarkets, fresh fish counters are ‘ho-hum.’ Fish purchases are therefore more often than not made in frozen form, but all lack organic fish.
We can understand how IntraFish have reached this conclusion but we, at Callander McDowell, cannot agree with it. For several years, we have conducted regular surveys of the retail sector and one fact that soon became apparent to us was that isolated visits to a couple of local stores, does not provide a reliable overview of either products available or the wider trends. What we have found is that fish and seafood availability and display can vary significantly with both local demographics and the spread of individual supermarket chains. Both also impact on the availability of organic species.
There have been a number of studies that show that fresh fish consumers tend to be in the higher income brackets and be better educated and more knowledgeable of the benefits of eating fish. Thus stores such as Marks & Spencers and Waitrose tend to offer a more varied range of fish. They also tend to stock a better choice of organic fish and seafood. However, customers of most other supermarkets can now buy chilled organic salmon and organic smoked salmon. Only the smallest chains such as the Coop and Somerfield do not stock such products as standard. Yet it is only Waitrose and selected Sainsbury’s stores that offer organic fish nationally both as chilled prepacked and loose from the fish counter. All the others provide chilled fish only and in many respects this is understandable. Prepacks provide a medium through which to convey all the necessary and relevant information about the organic product that cannot be provided in loose form unless a separate information sheet in inserted with the fish into the packaging. Chilled packs also can be stocked in the smallest stores without the need for specialist fish staff and it is for this reason, the standard of presentation has improved. We believe that it is of a much higher standard than found elsewhere in Europe.
We disagree with IntraFish that the poor state of fish counters means that most fish purchases are now made from the freezer cabinet. We have noticed a significant decline in the range of frozen products found in most supermarkets and certainly, organic products do not feature there. Frozen fish has tended to move towards the lower end of the market and the main focus has been on coated products. However, we acknowledge that in recent weeks, the picture is slightly changing. We attribute this to the Birds Eye adverts which have suggested that frozen fish is fresher than fresh and that freezing preserves the fish without the need of additives. As a result, the supermarkets have launched ranges of different frozen fish products both plain and added value. It remains to be seen whether consumers will respond to these products in the medium to longer term.
It is not surprising that organic seafood is not found in the freezer cabinet. Organic products are positioned at the top end of the market, whilst frozen products are typically at the bottom.
Of course, none of these observations really answer the question posed by IntraFish as to where the organic fish and seafood is in British supermarkets? The answer is not that the supermarkets are avoiding these organic products but that the industry is not yet producing them.
To be organic, fish and seafood must be farmed and as yet, there is only a limited range of farmed species in British supermarkets. An organic alternative is available for the main species; salmon trout and warm-water prawns. Organic cod is also increasingly available but so far organic sea bass, sea bream, turbot and halibut are not. Turbot and halibut are only available in tiny quantities and supplies are variable. Farmed sea bass and sea bream are widely available but clearly producers do not yet consider that there is sufficient margin to be made by conversion to organic. They could also be deterred by the ongoing confusion over which organic standards they should adhere to. Only this week, claims that organic cod are not truly organic have found their way into the media. Some people argue that the use of artificial lighting is not considered to part of the organic ethos, whilst others disagree.
The problem for organic fish and seafood is that the organic ethos does not translate well from terrestrial to aquatic farming. Instead, we, at Callander McDowell believe that a new and single sustainable standard is required through which consumers would recognise that aquaculture produce is produced in both a sustainable and ethical manner. Until then the use of different standards will only undermine the production of organic seafood as well as consumer confidence.