Brussels, 22/07/2013 (Agence Europe) - Brussels and Washington have confirmed that the issues linked to agriculture and to sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures will be the main stumbling blocks.
The EU and US negotiators in chief, Ignacio Bercero and Dan Mullaney respectively, have admitted after the first round of negotiations for a transatlantic trade and investment partnership (TTIP) in Washington at the beginning of July, that the SPS chapter will be the most difficult on which to seal an agreement.
During the first round, Bercero stressed to Mullaney that “we also have problems about access to the US market related to SPS obstacles that we've found to be unjustified” but he did not give further detail. Mullaney, for his part, explained that “considerable time” had been devoted to agriculture, saying that he was ready to resolve the issues on non-tariff barriers. Both Bercero and Mullaney agreed on the need to keep the political decision makers' attention on SPS issues which have long poisoned bilateral trade relations. “We intend to develop a framework that will allow effective bilateral regulatory cooperation to minimise SPS barriers in the future”, said US Trade Representative Mike Froman at the start of discussions.
On the SPS chapter, the EU is trying to revive an existing veterinary equivalency agreement which was signed in July 1999 - the objective of which was to ease friction in the trade of live animals and products like red meats, dairy, fish, hides and skin. The agreement did not, however, establish equivalency regulations because each side laid out additional steps for the other to complete before they would move to equivalency of regulation over time. Answering press, Bercero spoke of the parties' interest in seeing this agreement up-dated and made more effective.
As well as the SPS chapter, the first round covered all the issues of the regulatory agenda - in other words, transparency and coherence, the technical barriers to trade (TBT), and specific economic sectors. This first exchange of views enjoyed the involvement of the relevant regulatory agencies of the two negotiating partners. Brussels and Washington have agreed to move forward in parallel, horizontally and sector by sector on regulatory issues to reach an ambitious result, said Bercero.
Generally, the EU and US have identified the areas of convergence among the various components of the negotiation, and in the areas of divergence they have started to explore ways of reconciling the differences, Bercero stated. Bercero and Mullaney and their teams will meet again in Brussels during the week of 7 October, then in Washington in December. (EH/transl.fl)