Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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104. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation if there are sanitary and phytosanitary measures here that her Department estimates could be seen as being used for the purpose of trade protection and potentially open to challenge under the terms of CETA (details supplied); if she will provide a list of such SPS measures; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [32439/17]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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There are no sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures that could be opened to challenge under the terms of the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). CETA promotes co-operation between Canada and the EU on SPS issues.

Chapter 5 on SPS of CETA preserves the rights and obligations of the EU and of Canada under the Agreement on the Application of SPS Measures, contained in Annex 1A to the WTO Agreement. 

It maintains the EU and Canada's right to take the SPS measures necessary to protect against risks to food safety, animal or plant life or health and ensures that such measures by either side do not create unjustified barriers to trade, but rather facilitate trade.

The Chapter incorporates the existing 1998 Canada-EU Veterinary Agreement which currently applies to the trade in animal and animal products. It builds on the provisions of the 1998 Agreement to establish a framework for co-operation on the full scope of SPS measures - food safety, animal health, and plant health. In this regard, the Chapter contains detailed provisions with respect to regionalisation, equivalence, trade conditions, audit and verification, export certification, import checks and fees, notification and information exchange, emergency SPS measures, and the establishment of a Joint Management Committee for Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures.

The Agreement will not amend the EU or Canada's SPS rules and all products shall fully comply with the applicable SPS standards of the importing Party.