Canadian pork producers have welcomed the signing of the new EU-Canada free trade agreement while also urging government officials on both sides to keep working to resolve the “outstanding technical barriers” which remain.
“We have worked hard to develop a global reputation as a reliable supplier of safe, wholesome, high-quality pork and the key to sustaining our success is our ability to access a wide variety of markets,” said Canadian Pork Council (CPC) chair, Rick Bergmann, commenting in response to the signing of CETA (Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement) by Canada’s Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, and the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk.
“The Canadian and EU markets for pork complement each other and, while this relationship holds great promise, we look forward to government officials resolving the outstanding technical barriers that limit our ability to capitalize on what was achieved (through the CETA signing).”
CRC added its members play an important role in Canada’s agriculture and agri -food sector with pork production totalling close to 2 million tonnes a year, over two-thirds of which is exported.
“In 2015, over 1.1 million tonnes of pork was exported to over 100 different countries,” said CRC. “This makes Canada the third largest pork exporting country in terms of both value and volume and represents 20% of the world pork trade.”