Sweden is digging in on a proposal to ban imports of live lobsters into the European Union after a rebuke from American scientists, and the issue could go all the way to the World Trade Organization.
Sweden asked the European Union to bar imports of live American lobsters into the bloc earlier this year after 32 American lobsters were found in Swedish waters. The U.S. government then told the European Commission that the proposal isn’t supported by science, and American and Canadian scientists issued reports calling the Swedish claim into question.
Now, Sweden’s Agency for Marine and Water Management is issuing a response to criticism, and says the country is right to be cautious about the appearance of a foreign species in its waters. The response came out at the end of July and defends the prevention of the spread of American lobsters as “environmentally desirable and cost-effective.”
