Illegal alien cows!!!!

Apparently, in the U.S. “free flow of goods and services” under NAFTA doesn’t include cattle.

EFE (sory, lost the link!)

Live cattle exports to the United States will end the year down more than 50 percent due to U.S. food labelling law, Oswaldo Cházaro, president of the National Farmers Federation, or CNG, said on Thursday.

The labeling system has created discrimination against Mexican-produced meat products, he said.

The Country of Origin Labeling, or COOL, system means that a product is only deemed a product of the United States if every production phase takes place in the United States.

That means that U.S. slaughterhouses now have to divide animals in their facilities by country of origin, and create separate labeling methods within each factory.

The legislation, which entered into force in September, covers beef, chicken, pork, fish, seafood, fruit, nuts and fresh vegetables.

Chárazo said most of these products are exported to the United States once they have passed the final stage of production with a “Made in Mexico” label.

However, the vast majority of Mexican beef exports are live calves, sold to U.S. farmers for rearing at around six months old. These calves are raised and fattened in the United States for 10 months before being slaughtered.

Under previous rules these calves had been sold with the label “Made in the United States.”

U.S. meat producers have begun deducting the cost of the new structure from prices paid to Mexican farmers, Chárazo said. Six-month-old calves raised on the Mexican side of the border now sell at 85 cents a pound, while U.S. raised calves earn ranchers $1.2 per pound.

Chárazo called the 35-cent price difference “aberrant,” adding that it had never before been more than 10 cents.

From 2005 to 2007, Mexican farmers exported on average 1.32 million live cattle a year to the United States.

During the first 10 months of this year however, Mexico exported just over 500,000 head of calves, and the CNG estimates that Mexican farmers will export no more than 626,000 for the year as a whole, a decline of around 47.3 percent.

“We will have around 700,000 extra calves which will remain in Mexico, creating an overstock which will create an alarming price drop,” said Chárazo.

Meanwhile, U.S. meat exports to Mexico continue to soar, he said. He estimated full-year 2008 exports at around 416,300 tons, up from around 318,000 in 2007.

The Economy Secretariat had separately filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization on behalf of Mexican farmers, Chárazo said.

The Washington Post reports that  Canada has joined the suit filed with the World Trade Organization.