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Codex Alimentarius Commission Report for NHF
Codex Alimentarius Commission Report for National Health Federation member Scott Tips,
Date: 7/14/2011 10:31:31 PM ( 13 y ) ... viewed 23781 times
READ THE FULL REPORT HERE
BY SCOTT TIPS,
PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONAL HEALTH FEDERATION
http://www.thenhf.com/article.php?id=2945
The Ugly American
The word on the street was that had the ractopamine standard passed (and it still could at next year’s meeting), then Brazil planned to launch a WTO trade challenge against the EU, while the U.S. had similar plans against China. Already the U.S. and Canada have complaints regarding the EU’s ban on meat treated with growth-promoting hormones.[11] Codex standards have become weapons, as well as shields, in WTO trade disputes concerning food.
The U.S. and Canadian delegates know this all too well, and they plot their coordinated strategies around creating legal bases for trade challenges or threats of trade challenges so that they can sell more of their doctored foods around the World. Since the Canadians are perceived more as the remora fish of North America, clinging onto the United States, it is the Americans themselves who are seen as the big bullies at Codex meetings, using whatever means at hand to achieve their pecuniary goals. More than once I heard extremely harsh words expressed by others against the actions of the U.S. delegate.
To many of the Codex delegates, the United States’ actions seem purely money oriented. If health or science is ever mentioned by the American delegate, one can almost always be sure it has been twisted towards this solitary goal. It is all about money – and health be damned.
When the U.S. delegate first spoke out in support of ractopamine doping, she meticulously read her oh-so-carefully prepared scriipt in a weak, falsetto voice that had me straining to see what she looked like and if she had actually graduated yet from high school. Her speech was a script, well-written but devoid of any conviction. She might as well have been reading from her shopping list. By contrast, when the EU and Norwegian delegates spoke, it was obvious their extemporaneous words came from a heart-bound belief in what they were saying.
Later, during the review and correction of the CAC report on the last day of the meeting, the U.S. delegate revealed just how utterly petty she could be. The NHF had been specifically mentioned in the report as opposing the adoption of the narasin standard for animal use. No one had objected to that mention, not even the Chairwoman; but the U.S. delegate specifically demanded that NHF’s name be removed from the report and our comment referred to anonymously. Having succeeded there, the U.S. then tried but failed to have a specific reference to the EU removed in a later paragraph. And yet with her goldfish-like memory, the US delegate saw no hypocrisy in attempting to insert comments into the report that she had not even made. Is it any wonder that so many dislike the U.S. at these meetings?
But perhaps the biggest offense of all is that the American delegates never seem to learn from others, or even be open to learning. Sophocles wrote words long ago that are just as true today: “It can be no dishonor to learn from others when they speak good sense.” Many delegates spoke good sense when they explained their opposition to ractopamine doping. The U.S. has one calendar year until the next Commission meeting that will take up again the ractopamine debate. Next time, what will it be for the United States? Honor? Or more dishonor?
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