China said on Wednesday that it plans to file a complaint against the United States at the World Trade Organisation over US rules it says are blocking it from exporting poultry to that market. The Chinese Commerce Ministry said it took issue with a section in the spending bill approved by the US Congress on Tuesday that states that no funds under it may be used to establish or implement a rule allowing poultry imports from China.
The US rules were "clearly unfair and malicious", Commerce Ministry spokesman Yao Jian said in a statement on the ministrys website. "China will file a case at the WTO and reserves the right to take further measures," Yao said. China has been hit by a series of food and product safety scandals in the past few years, ranging from fake drugs to the industrial chemical melamine being found in dairy products.
Executives in the Chinese poultry feed industry also said last week that the impact of bird flu and the domestic economic slowdown may have cut the countrys poultry numbers by about a third or more in the last month. If Beijing files a complaint, it will be its fourth since it joined the WTO in 2001.
Yao said Chinas poultry industry now met international standards for safety and quality control and that there were no justifiable technical or food safety reasons for the United States to bar Chinese imports of cooked poultry. He called on Washington to rescind the rule as soon as possible. China has strongly criticised the "Buy American" provisions of the US stimulus package, saying it is strongly opposed to any rise in protectionist measures in the wake of the global economic slowdown.