October 22, 2014 

MEDIA ADVISORY

Contact: Kate Fried, Food & Water Watch, (202) 683-4905, kfried@fwwatch.org 

Trade Experts to Convene Reporters’ Briefing on WTO’s Rejection of Country-of-Origin Labeling (COOL)

Washington, D.C.— On Thursday, October 23, representatives from Food & Water Watch, National Farmers Union, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch and the U.S. Cattleman’s Association will convene a teleconference for members of the press to discuss the details and implications of this week’s World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling on Country-of-Origin Labeling (COOL) for beef and pork. On Monday, the WTO released the long-awaited, 200-plus page narrower ruling against the labels that nonetheless found that the regulatory goal of COOL was WTO-legal and that the new 2013 COOL labels provided better information for consumers. 

WHO:            Roger Johnson, President, National Farmers Union

Lori Wallach, Director, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch

Patrick Woodall, Research Director, Food & Water Watch

Danni Beer, President, U.S. Cattlemen’s Association

WHAT:    Press briefing on WTO COOL labeling ruling. Trade experts and COOL advocates will drill into the details of the WTO compliance ruling and discuss the next steps for the popular labeling law while maintaining the integrity of the COOL labels.       

WHEN:     Thursday, October 23, 11:00 AM EDT

DIAL-IN:    To register for the teleconference and get the dial-in information, contact Kate Fried at (202) 683-4905 or kfried@fwwatch.org

Food & Water Watch works to ensure the food, water and fish we consume is safe, accessible and sustainable. So we can all enjoy and trust in what we eat and drink, we help people take charge of where their food comes from, keep clean, affordable, public tap water flowing freely to our homes, protect the environmental quality of oceans, force government to do its job protecting citizens, and educate about the importance of keeping shared resources under public control.

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