A bipartisan group of 114 lawmakers urged U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer Thursday to force the European Union to include agriculture in the upcoming U.S.-EU trade talks.
“As you know, agriculture is the source of a great number of trade barriers and irritants in the U.S.-EU trading relationship,” the lawmakers said in a letter sent to Lighthizer Thursday. “Thus, an agreement with the EU that does not address trade in agriculture would be, in our eyes, unacceptable.”
They warned that “an agreement that fails to include agricultural products would be deficient, significantly jeopardizing Congressional support.”
The letter was organized by Reps. Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., Ron Kind, D-Wis., Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., and Angie Craig, D-Minn. It was signed by 93 Republicans and 21 Democrats.
The EU limits the entry of lower-priced grains from non-EU countries through quotas and a complicated price system based on U.S. exchange prices and transportation costs. It also blocks products through regulations regarding the use of pesticide, hormones, and biotechnology. Labeling is strictly regulated too, with the EU prohibiting the use of names like “Parmesan” or “Asiago” for products produced outside of Europe. The U.S. farming and food processing industries argue that these “non-tariff barriers” are mere pretenses to protect the EU industries from competition.
The policies are popular inside Europe, however. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom has repeatedly told reporters in recent months that they would not negotiate on the matter. The Trump administration has pressed the EU to back away from the hardline stance, but Lighthizer conceded during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Tuesday that they hadn’t gotten them to budge.
“The U.S. cannot have a trade deal with Europe that does not deal with agriculture and their view is that they cannot have one that does, so we’re at a stalemate and we’ll see how that develops,” Lighthizer said.
In Thursday’s letter, the lawmakers urged the White House to keep up the pressure. “We were encouraged to see that the negotiating objectives for the EU that your office released in January included specific objectives on agricultural good,” the letter said.
