Next we recognize Mr. Bob Turley of Purdue Farms and the U.S. Poultry & Egg Export Council.

MR. TURLEY: Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the poultry industry's objectives for the upcoming round of World Trade Organization negotiations.

I'm Bob Turley, president and chief operating officer of Purdue Farms in Salisbury, Maryland. And just a personal note, I've been involved in agriculture all may life. Grew up on a farm in the midwest, chicken, cows and dairy cows. And I went to college.

At Perdue, we produce the process and market chicken and turkey products in the eastern United States and internationally. There are two of us who are here on behalf of U.S. Poultry & Egg Export Council to address issues to be covered in the trade talks that affects the global interests and exporters.

We will each cover separate aspects of our industry's global interests. We will also make available to you a separate more detailed paper on these topics.

Exports have become a critical issue on the U.S. poultry industry in just a few short years. In 1998, American companies exported more than one-and-a-half billion dollars worth of poultry and eggs.

Exports could mean the difference between making a profit or taking a loss. Industry-wide exports account for nearly 15 percent of the total annual production of chicken on a tonnage basis.

Depending on the product mix, U.S. companies do between 10 and 35 percent of their business offshore. Still U.S. exporters continue to face substantial government-imposed impediments to sales to most countries. Previous multilateral trade negotiations have eliminated a number of the most objectionable form of trade barriers; namely, quotas, verbal levies and prohibitions. But those barriers have been replaced by high tariffs, tariff quotas, special safeguard mechanisms and even unjustifiable health regulations. For example, only a few years ago, the U.S. exported more than $55 million of poultry to the EU. Now the export ... for to be made into pet food because of our failure to reach a sanitary equivalence agreement with the Europeans.

The next round of multilevel trade negotiations will offer an opportunity to obtain uniform reductions and barriers to export and U.S. poultry products, possibly the only real opportunity in 20 years or the next 20 years. We understand that the U.S. is deciding which negotiating approach to use in the next round. The question's whether the bundled elements of the negotiation and attempt to achieve so-called early harvest in specific areas take up a more traditional approach which no specific subject area is formally concluded into all, the single undertaking approach, which you mentioned.

The poultry industry agrees with most others in the U.S. agriculture and agricultural exports who believe that early harvest approach could never provide the tradeoffs or generate the pressure that will be necessary to yield a substantial result for agriculture.

We believe that all the elements of an agreement must be concluded simultaneously. Thus, affording agriculture a maximum opportunity for success.

There is also consideration being given to negotiate on a request/offer basis, rather than pick up where the Uruguay Round left off with an across-the-board trade to starting measures. The request/offer approach benefits sectors of the country whose principle concerns are with the loss of import protection.

The best outcome for our industry would be achieved by having the negotiations pick up from where the Uruguay Round left off. In fact, this was actually a provision in that agreement when agriculture was included with a built-in agency for the upcoming round.

Picking up on the Uruguay Round framework for the negotiations will guarantee that the issues of crucial importance to our industry market success and subsidy will be included in the new round.

Because of the tremendous stakes involved in the new round for the poultry industry, our industry believes the U.S. must support a single undertaking in the next round and adopt a negotiating framework based on the Uruguay Round approach.

Finally, the issue of timing of the negotiation is important to us in agriculture. Many in the industry are urging that the administration press for a three-year time limit, at least as an objective. We urge the administration to take these concerns into account as it develops its position in the Seattle negotiations.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to present this.

UNDER SECRETARY SCHUMACHER: Thank you, Mr. Turley. You're in fine company. Maybe our next speaker will be talking more about the SPS issue. If not, would you want to address that because, for example, on poultry, you indicated briefly the non-tariff barrier still. I think this week we signed the veterinary equivalence agreement with the European Union, setting an important principle.

But the wider issue of SPS, there are some environmental and other groups would like to see the SPS agreement opened up. I'm not too keen on that. I think that served us well and we won a number of cases in the WTO. Do you have any thoughts on poultry and SPS?

MR. TURLEY: Well, you did mention equivalency; correct? We would ask in the equivalence that we have a level playing feel to play on. Most of us in our country have been in other processing plants, for example, around the world and we truly believe, you know, we have the most up-to-date modern sanitary plants in the world. That becomes questionable as we visit facilities in other countries.

As far as the rest of your question, I would like to defer that to the next speaker.

UNDER SECRETARY SCHUMACHER: Thank you very much.