The top American agriculture official on Tuesday called on the European Union to do more to ease restrictions on gene-altered food and feed crops if it hoped to reach a trans-Atlantic trade pact.
“There can’t be a trade agreement without a serious and significant commitment to agriculture,” the official, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, told reporters on Tuesday, a day after an informal meeting with European farm ministers. European consumers “ought to have a choice” whether to use biotech foods, he said.
Negotiators are trying to reach a Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, an agreement that goes far beyond cutting import duties by creating a more uniform market and by synchronizing regulations for products like automobiles and medicines. But after five rounds of meetings, the negotiators are at odds in important areas, including how to lower tariffs, whether to include financial services in any deal, and how to create freer trade in food and farming.
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