USA is the first export destination for EU’s food and drink products: the value of these trades in 2012 amounted to € 13.6 bn.
So it is understandable the interest to an agreement on both sides of the ocean, and the enthusiasm for the formal launch of negotiations announced at the G8 summit in Northern Ireland. The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) could bring great benefits, both in terms of economic growth, and employment.
The President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, said:
“We intend to move forward fast. We can say that neither of us will give up content for the sake of speed, but we intend to make rapid progress. I’d rather see the core challenge, moving our regulatory regime closer, and addressing the harmful effect of behind-the-border trade barriers. Huge economics benefits are expected from reducing red tape, avoiding divergent regulations for the future. The potential economic gains for the EU are estimated at around € 120 billion a year. And the real beauty of this deal is that it will offer real returns of around € 545 per average household in Europe almost for free. This makes it the cheapest stimulus package one can imagine”.
These are the reactions of FoodDrinkEurope President, Jesús Serafín Pérez:
“Europe’s food and drink industry welcomes the formal launch of trade negotiations between the European Union and the United States. We particularly welcome President Barroso’s announcement that the parties will look at ways to ‘reduce red tape and avoid divergent regulations for the future’. As Europe’s largest manufacturing industry, and the world’s largest exporter and importer of food and drink products, we look forward to playing an active role and providing input to the negotiations on this Agreement, which has the potential to drive growth and facilitate access to a major export market, thereby generating new opportunities for Europe’s food and drink manufacturers”.
David Cameron said the deal would be the biggest in history and was a “once in a generation prize” he was determined to seize.
“There is no more powerful way to achieve that than by boosting trade and there’s no better way than by launching these negotiations on a landmark deal between the European Union and the United States of America, a deal that could add as much as £100 billion to the EU economy, £80 billion to the US economy and as much as £85 billion to the rest of the world”.
He added: “We are talking about what could be the biggest bilateral trade deal in history. A deal that will have a greater impact than all the other trade deals on the table put together.”
However several regulatory barriers remain: just think about the different positions about the hormone treated beef meat.
An example of the cooperation between EU and US could be the recent bilateral cooperation arrangement on organic equivalence. The EU and U.S. have recognised each other’s organic production rules and control systems as equivalent under their respective rules. This type of recognition, also referred to as an “equivalence arrangement”, means that organic products certified to the USDA organic or European Union (EU) organic standards may be sold and labelled as organic in both the U.S. and the EU. As long as the operation is certified by a USDA-accredited certifying agent or an EU Member State recognised control body or control authority, this recognition eliminates the need for EU organic operators to have a separate certification to the U.S. standards (NOP) and vice versa.
The first round of negotiations it will be in Washington on July 8th and the process is expected to take up to two years.
Related articles
- G8 summit: America and European Union trade deal negotiations launched that could see £100 billion brought to EU (dailyrecord.co.uk)
- EU, US launch talks on vast free trade deal (thenewstribe.com)
- G8: Negotiations on new US/EU trade agreement to get underway after summit (independent.ie)
FOOD LAW LATEST 