ASA SAYS EC OILSEED POLICY ILLEGAL UNDER GATT The American Soybean Association (ASA) denounced European Community (EC) oilseed policies as illegal under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and threatened to make an unfair trade complaint if the EC does not remedy the situation. ASA Vice President James Adams told an ASA-sponsored Outlook 87 conference: "It will be filed unless the EC takes drastic and immediate steps." "These subsidies are blatantly unfair and are GATT illegal, since they were established after the zero soybean duty was established in 1962," he said. The ASA's unfair trade petition against the EC would ask for an investigation and modification of EC oilseed policies to make the regime non-discriminatory. The EC in 1962 ruled all EC oilseed imports duty-free, in an effort to fill its oilseed needs. But EC oilseeds production has risen dramatically since then. The EC now guarantees oilseed prices to farmers above world market levels and is considering implementing a controversial oils and fats tax. The subsidies "are obvious attempts to circumvent the zero duty binding and that makes U.S. Farmers mad as hell," Adams said. The ASA is confident the U.S. Congress will support its trade complaint, Adams said. The ASA also strongly opposes an EC proposal to tax vegetable and marine oils consumed in the EC, which will be considered by the EC Commission in December. U.S. Soybean world market share has declined 35 pct in volume and 40 pct in value since 1982, primarily as a result of EC policies, Adams added. Lord Plumb, European Parliament President and a speaker at the conference, said the EC expanded oilseed production in 1973 when the U.S. Halted overseas sales of soy products.