RESTRICTEDWORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SG/Q2/SVN/1
10 February 1999
(99-0486)
Committee on Safeguards Original:  English
NOTIFICATION UNDER ARTICLE 12.1(A) OF THE AGREEMENT ON
SAFEGUARDS ON INITIATION OF AN INVESTIGATION
AND THE REASONS FOR IT
AND
NOTIFICATION UNDER ARTICLE 12.4 OF THE AGREEMENT ON
SAFEGUARDS BEFORE TAKING A PROVISIONAL SAFEGUARDS
MEASURE REFERRED TO IN ARTICLE 6
Questions Posed by the UNITED STATES
Regarding the Notification of SLOVENIA1
The following communication, dated 5 February 1999, has been received from the Permanent
Mission of the United States.
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According to the information provided in G/SG/N/6/SVN/1 and G/SG/N/7/SVN/1,
26 November 1998, the Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Slovenia decided to initiate a
safeguards investigation and to impose a provisional safeguard measure, in the form of specific tariffincreases, on the importation of meat from swine, fresh, chilled or frozen, under heading 0203 of the
Harmonized Tariff Schedule for Slovenia.
In G/SG/N/1/SVN/1, 9 January 1996, the Perm anent Mission of Slovenia notified the
Committee on Safeguards (“Committee”) that Slovenia did not, at present, have any legislationrelating to safeguard measures.  We are not aware of any further notifications of safeguards legislation
made by Slovenia.
• Did Slovenia notify the Committee of its safeguards laws and regulations, as required by
Article 12.6 of the WTO Agreement on Safeguards?  If yes, please provide the official
citation and date of this notification.
• If the notification has not yet been made, when do you intend to do so?  Article 12.6 of the
Agreement on Safeguards provides that this notification shall be notified promptly to the
Committee.
• When did Slovenia enact its safeguard legislation and regulations?  Please provide an official
legal citation for these laws and regulations, along with a translated copy, to the Committee
for review.
                                                     
1 G/SG/N/6/SVN/1, G/SG/N/7/SVN/1 and G/SG/N/7/SVN/Suppl.1.G/SG/Q2/SVN/1
Page 2
According to G/SG/N/6/SVN/1, on 15 October 1998, the Ministry of Agriculture decided to
initiate an investigation to determine if the “S lovenian swine meat market” was threatened with
serious injury.
• Did Slovenia establish and make public, in consonance with Article X of GATT 1994,
procedures for the investigation prior to its initiation, as required by Article 3 of the WTO
Agreement on Safeguards?  On what date were safeguard investigation procedures published?
Was information about the procedures published in the Official Gazette?  Please provide the
official citation for these procedures.
• Was a petition filed on behalf of the swine meat industry, or did the Ministry of Agriculture
self-initiate this process?  Did any such petition request the imposition of provisionalsafeguard measures?  If the process was initiated by petition, please provide to the Secretariat
a translated copy for review by interested exporting countries.
• Which countries are the principal suppliers of swine meat to Slovenia?
• The information provided in G/SG/N/6/SVN/1  and G/SG/N/7/SVN/1 included import data
covering only the months of August, September and October for the years 1997 and 1998.Please provide monthly swine meat import data for the past three years.
• We note in G/SG/N/7/SVN/1 that 8,371 tons of  swine meat were imported into Slovenia
during the period August-October 1998.  What was the total apparent consumption of swinemeat during that same period in Slovenia?  What was the annual total apparent consumption
of swine meat for the past three years?
• Please explain why the notification refers to threat of serious injury to the “Slovenian meat
market,” as opposed to “domestic industry,” as required by Article 2 of the Agreement on
Safeguards.  Please explain how the definition of “Slovenian meat market,” for the purposes
of this investigation, comports with the definition of “domestic industry,” as provided in
Article 4.1(c) of the Agreement on Safeguards.
According to the information provided in G/SG/N/6/SVN/1, a safeguards investigation was
initiated relating to the “threat” of serious injury.  However, according to the information provided in
G/SG/N/7/SVN/1, the preliminary determination fo und that increased imports “have already caused”
serious injury to domestic breeders.
• Is the safeguard investigation concerned exclusively with whether increased imports are
threatening serious injury to the domestic industry?  Please explain the apparent discrepancy
between N/6 and N/7 noted above.
According to G/SG/N/7/SVN/1/Suppl. 1, 22 Janu ary 1999, it is reported that the Slovenian
authorities have terminated the provisional safeguard measure.
• Can you confirm this and provide further details concerning the nature of this action?
Notwithstanding the termination of any provisio nal measure, is the safeguards investigation
still under way?G/SG/Q2/SVN/1
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• Please identify any and all countries that were excluded from the provisional tariff increases
that were described in paragraph 2 of G/SG /N/7/SVN/1.  Did Slovenia exclude developing
country imports from the tariff increases per Article 9 of the WTO Agreement on Safeguards?
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