Title: The European agro-food system in the outlook of the adoption of transatlantic trade and investment partnership

Authors: Simone Vieri; Grazia Calabrò

Addresses: Department of Management, La Sapienza University of Rome, Via del Castro Laurenziano 9, Roma, 00161, Italy ' Department of Economics, University of Messina, Piazza Pugliatti 1, Messina, 98124, Italy

Abstract: European Union (EU) together with the USA is engaged in the definition of an international negotiation called Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). When completed, the negotiation should lead to the elimination of tariffs and reduction of non-tariff barriers. It is not easy to manage this problem as EU and USA have a different legislative approach on critical themes such as food security and environmental safeguarding. It is therefore evident that the agreements on non-tariff barriers products will be through a mutual recognition rather than the standardisation of regulations. This means that producers operating in systems with more stringent regulations will have highest production costs and less competitiveness. The risk of a modification of European regulation is concrete even if, at present, EU wants to maintain the current level of guarantee.

Keywords: food trade; consumer protection; precautionary principle; trade agreements; Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership; TTIP; agrifood industry; foodstuffs; environmental production; food safety; tariff barriers; non-tariff barriers; agriculture; European Union; EU; USA; United States; mutual recognition; production costs; competitiveness; European regulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJENVH.2015.077117

International Journal of Environment and Health, 2015 Vol.7 No.4, pp.295 - 308

Received: 08 Jul 2015
Accepted: 09 Oct 2015

Published online: 21 Jun 2016 *

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