Brussels, 20/12/2013 (Agence Europe) - The third round of technical talks for a transatlantic free-trade agreement has brought about substantial progress ahead of an initial political assessment in early 2014.
At the end of the third TTIP meeting, held in Washington on 16-20 December, the EU and US chief negotiators, Ignacio Garcia Bercero and Dan Mullaney respectively, spoke of “progress”, especially in three key elements of the TTIP - market access, regulatory aspects and rules - which will be the focus of discussions during the fourth round of negotiations in Brussels on 4 March.
As regards market access, the EU reiterated its determination to stay ambitious on slashing tariffs on goods, opening public procurement, and liberalising services and investment flows.
As regards the regulatory element, the negotiators discussed regulation on health and environmental protection, data security and the financial domain. The parties wanted to start work in March 2014 on the wording for the arrangements aiming to facilitate each party's respect of the rules, and to enable the regulation authorities to collaborate closely during the drafting of future regulations. Such arrangements would cover rules on food safety and animal and plant health (sanitary and phytosanitary), technical regulations and product standards, and testing and certification procedures (technical barriers to trade).
Lastly, the negotiators also made progress on rules linked to trade - including issues of competition, access to energy and raw materials, protection of people's rights at work, the environment, customs procedures and trade facilitation.
This third round concludes the initial phase of the TTIP negotiations and paves the way for a political stocktaking meeting between European Commissioner for Trade Karel De Gucht and US Trade Representative Michael Froman in 2014 - probably at the beginning of February. “We can be very satisfied by the end of this third round of talks. We remain on track to deliver an ambitious investment deal which will boost our economies, deliver growth and, more importantly, create jobs”, said Bercero, yet again giving assurances that any deal would uphold “the highest standards of consumer, environment, health and labour protection”. (EH/transl.fl)