10:02 AM Oct 9, 1996

US SHRIMP RESTRICTIONS CHALLENGED

Geneva 8 Oct (Chakravarthi Raghavan) -- Four Asian countries have lodged a complaint and have sought consultations at the World Trade Organization with the United States over its ban on imports of shrimp.

India, Malaysia, Pakistan and Thailand have sent a letter to the US Mission to the WTO seeking consultations under Art XXII of the GATT 1994 and the WTO's Dispute Settlement Understanding.

Consultations are an essential first step towards seeking adjudication of the dispute.

The US ban came into force in May this year, after the US Court of International Trade in New York accepted a petition of an environmental group that imported wild shrimps in the seas were caught with nets that killed sea turtles and their imports should be banned.

The ban on shrimp caught in areas of seas where sea-turtles are found, affects millions of dollars of worth of shrimp exports of these Asian countries who are engaged in marine shrimp fishing.

The US ban does not affect shrimp grown by aqua-culture methods in shrimp farms. Most Latin American countries, who also export to the United States, catch shrimp in cold waters where there are no sea-turtles.

While environmental groups in the US have acclaimed the ban as supporting conservation of sea turtles, many environmental groups in Asia say that in fact the shrimp-farming (where the pesticides and chemicals used to grow shrimps in coastal areas) in fact cause more environmental harm -- to the subsistence agriculture in nearby areas and also to sea turtles and their nesting grounds because of the seepage of the water from the shrimp farms into the sea.

According to some US estimates, some 200 to 500 million dollars worth of shrimps or 25% of all imports would be hit by the ban.

The challenge from the four countries acting jointly are challenging the ban as violative of several GATT provisions, and an exercise in extra-territoriality by the United States.

Under the DSU, the US has ten days to respond to the request for consultations, and begin the consultations within 30 days. If no settlement is reached in the consultations within another 30 days, the parties can seek the establishment of a panel whose ruling (subject to appeal to the Appellate Body) would be automatically binding.