Food fights: on the escalating dispute over the Russian import of EU-produced food

It is no surprise that the latest development in the prolonged dispute over the import of EU-produced foodstuffs into Russia should be connected to the horsemeat-scandal that has erupted in the Union in past weeks. This time, Chief Sanitary Inspector Gennady Onishchenko threatens the suspension of all meat imports from Russia’s largest trading partner. This seemingly reasonable effort to avoid the fraudulently, but not dangerously, mislabelled mince from infesting the Russian market may, however, set off further tensions in the EU-Russian foodtrade.

For, as indispensable as the Russian import of EU foodstuffs is for both parties involved, it has recently been a cause for a rather fraught relationship.

Unsurprisingly, the ban on the import of live pigs, cattle, sheep and goats from the EU last March – which left Latvia and Estonia without a market for two-thirds of their pork production – and more recently, the ban on German chilled meat as well as EU seed potatoes, have spiked a fiery dispute between Russian and EU officials.

Moscow’s veterinary surveillance agency, Rosselkozhnadzor, justified last year’s ban on live animals with fears of the newly-found Schmallenberg-virus, causing birth defects in sheep, goats and cattle.The new bans on chilled meat from Germany and seed potatoes from the Netherlands and across the continent are, on the other hand, not connected to the horsemeat-circus or any other current public outrage; according to the agency and its mother institution, the Ministry of Agriculture, they are to be accounted for by the EU sanitary regulations falling short of Customs Union norms. The potato ban – that affects virtually every individual in the Russian Federation – has provoked an intense reaction in the countrydue to fears of rising prices, which representatives of domestic suppliers nonetheless continue to rule out.

Meanwhile, European and American media have widely attributed Russia’s ban on U.S. meat to the general cooling of Russian-American relations, largely due to the Magnitsky bill, signed into law by President Obama last December against a backdrop of uproar in Russian officialdom. On the whole, the case of the ban on German meat seems to be rather similar, the measure being taken in a context of frosty Moscow-Berlin relations after Angela Merkel’s open avowal of disappointment at Putin’s return to presidency last year, and her harsh criticism of the quality of democracy in the Federation, as well as its human rights record. The numerous restrictions on Russian agricultural products in force in the EU and elsewhere might also stir up the conflict; in fact, Pravda states it is not clear whether the seed potato ban is being used to put pressure on European authorities to provide the necessary qualifications for the products in question, or is designed “to give an equivalent response to some actions taken by the West”.

The European Union – whilst publishing material on its official websites in support of the quality of its SPS (sanitary and phytosanitary) regulations and emphasizing the efforts that have been made to harmonise these with CU norms – is exasperated, seeing the measures as an effort to minimize the effects of the market opening due to take place with Russia’s new membership in the World Trade Organization, in several instances arguing the vagueness ofthe bans’ rationale.At the same time, these, believed to be substantial obstacles to free trade, continue to incite severe criticism from the EU’s Trade Commissioner, Karel de Gucht, who has threatened to raise the food supply issue, along with other controversial matters, with the global body.

For all that, a complete suspension of meat imports is unlikely to be anything but strictly temporary – and since the European market is being cleared of the mislabelled horsemeat, it would, whether intended or not, carry a similar political message to that of the earlier measures. Even though, as Vladimir Chizhov, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the European Union, asserts in an interview with viEUws, the Federation sees the food supply issue as a matter of nothing but public health, the issue does evidently contribute to a general cooling of EU-Russia relations.

Whether a lifting of the bans will be occasioned by rising prices of Russian foodstuffs, pressure from the WTO or yet something else, it will be necessary for the widening of cooperation between the two giants – something both of them should be working for.