During a high-level meeting in Washington this week, European farmer and cooperative representative organisation Copa-Cogeca has warned of the logistical problems for exporting fresh produce to the US.
The group highlighted issues such as costly labelling and shipping rules, stressing that these barriers to trade must be overcome to ensure a successful outcome to ongoing free trade talks between the EU and US.
Speaking at the stakeholder event, Copa-Cogeca commodities and trade director Arnaud Petit stressed: “We believe that the agriculture negotiations in the free trade talks between the EU and US are not too tough to handle. The fact that 40 per cent of agricultural raw materials processed by the EU food industry come from non-EU countries shows that the EU is already open to global trade.
'Around 70 per cent of EU agricultural exports are also processed products like cheese, wine, processed meat at the high value end of the market,' he explained. 'The biggest obstacle to trade therefore comes from unnecessary red tape and barriers to trade, costly rules and obligations, like labelling and packaging requirements.
'In the fruit and vegetable sector, phytosanitary barriers prevent European fruit from entering the US market. This must be addressed. It is crucial to ensure that non-tariff trade barriers are tackled. We believe that most of the gains from a trade deal – three quarters in fact – come from lifting non-tariff trade barriers. We therefore urge negotiatiors to ensure these are lifted.'
Copa-Cogeca said that it had, together with the European food industry, put together a report on non-tariff barriers, which should be addressed as part of the SPS negotiations.
In addition, the negotiations should also promote international standards, the organisation noted.
