The Chicken War

After a recent visit to the U.S., West Germany's Minister without Portfolio Heinrich Krone returned to Bonn with a telling assessment of official Washington's mood. Said Krone: "Everyone is preoccupied with Cuba, Berlin, Laos-and chickens." Konrad Adenauer confided not long ago that he and President Kennedy have had voluminous correspondence during the past two years, "and I guess that about half of it has been about chickens." Last week the cause of all this chicken talk-tariffs-took an unexpected turn. Into effect throughout the Common Market went a raised tariff on imports of U.S. chickens-just when the U.S. thought that the levy was about to be lowered.

The Common Market levy threatens to close U.S. poultry farmers' richest export market. In a broader sense, the chicken tariff has become the test of whether the Common Market really wants freer trade with the U.S. After Europeans-and chiefly the Germans-began developing a taste for chicken five years ago, U.S. exports rose spectacularly, reaching $28 million in 1962's first six months. Then the great chicken war opened when the Common Market, spurred by its own poultry raisers, last year began raising the tariff on U.S. chickens to cut the heavy flow. Result: U.S. exports have since declined 67% . American representatives scooted across Europe to lobby for rescinding the increases, thought that they had convinced the Common Market to do so when the new hike came (from 130 to 14.250 per lb.).

Behind the hike were the French, who introduced the higher tariff and persuaded the Germans to go along with it. But German poultry farmers have little to thank the French for; by cutting off the U.S., the French hope to win a greater share of the lucrative German chicken market for their own poultry farmers. The U.S. has asked the Common Market to start negotiations later this month aimed at setting aside the increase. If the negotiations fail, the U.S. is legally entitled under GATT to retaliate against Common Market imports-a step that would give it little satisfaction and might permanently cancel the opportunity for many American chickens to take a trip to Europe.

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