US embassy cable - 05ATHENS574

UNCLAS ATHENS 000574 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: EAGR, ECON, GR, AMB 
SUBJECT: AMBASSADOR RIES CALLS ON GREEK MINISTER OF 
AGRICULTURE 
 
 
1.  (U) SUMMARY: Ambassador Ries paid an introductory call on 
Greek Minister of Agriculture Evangelos Basiakos on February 
22.  Ambassador discussed the USG's three prime objectives 
for agricultural trade with Greece: (1) to retain the U.S. 
market for conventional corn- and cotton seeds for planting 
in Greece; (2) to recover the $12 million wheat market in 
Greece; and (3) to gain the GoG's support for restarting U.S. 
poultry meat imports into the EU.  END SUMMARY. 
 
2.  (U)  In a meeting with Minister of Agriculture Basiakos 
on February 22, Ambassador Ries addressed issues whose 
resolution will help promote agricultural trade between the 
U.S. and Greece.  First, Ambassador urged that the GoG should 
follow a clear, scientific standard when testing conventional 
corn and cotton seeds for adventitious presence of biotech 
material.  Basiakos responded that the GoG continues to 
follow the 2001 Greek Ministerial Decision and has not 
imposed additional restrictions.  In the spring of 2004, 
however, the GoG intensified testing for adventitious 
presence so as not to be caught out by "gotcha" NGO testing. 
The Greek Ministry of Agriculture increased the testing 
sample size and increased the incidence of testing with the 
consequence of positive findings for biotech content in 75 
percent of the seed lots tested -- compared with less than 10 
percent under the previous interpretation.  Because the 
essence of the issue is the GoG's interpretation of the 
Ministerial Decision, Ambassador noted that the U.S. is 
asking the GoG to change its approach to the protocol rather 
than the protocol itself. 
 
3.  (U) Second, Ambassador encouraged the GoG to take steps 
to allow U.S. wheat to re-enter the Greek market.  After the 
1996 discovery of karnal bunt in the U.S., the U.S. lost the 
$12 million wheat market to Canada when Greece instituted a 
difficult and scientifically unjustifiable protocol for 
karnal bunt testing.  A 2000 Greek Ministerial Decree allows 
the importation of U.S. cereals, however, some of its 
elements pose undue risk to traders.  For example, the length 
of time an importer must await laboratory testing results 
while the cargo is kept in declared storage facilities is 
unspecified -- this poses a risk to the importer, who is 
responsible for the cargo, despite it being out of the 
importer's control.  While Greece has imported very little 
U.S. wheat since 2000, it has imported Mexican wheat seeds 
for planting without imposing karnal bunt restrictions on 
these seeds despite the fact that Mexico is also affected by 
karnal bunt.  Further, Ambassador noted that Italy has 
developed a scientific method that allows for the importation 
of good quality U.S. wheat, and he offered to engage Italian 
officials to help overcome this issue in Greece. 
 
4.  (U) Finally, Ambassador urged the GoG to support a change 
in EU regulations to allow the resumption of poultry meat 
imports from the U.S.  Although the EU banned imports of U.S. 
poultry meat because of chlorine use in U.S. production 
facilities in 1997, the U.S. and EU have since resolved the 
relevant scientific health and safety issues.  EU members, 
however, are linking the U.S. poultry issue to the EU swine 
fever issue and refusing to restart U.S. poultry imports. 
Ambassador argued that the EU should not link sanitary and 
phyto-sanitary (SPS) issues.  Basiakos replied that the U.S. 
should not link the rice dispute to Greek peaches. 
Ambassador distinguished the rice dispute by noting it 
related to a market access binding the EU was proposing to 
break.  The WTO is based on an exchange of market access 
commitments, and provides for withdrawal of concessions in 
cases where a member fails to meet obligations.  This is 
different from the SPS provisions, where WTO members are 
obligated to implement controls consistent with science and 
health requirements, but are not authorized to link one SPS 
action to another. 
RIES