Sunday 7 December 2014

CHLORINE CHICKEN, HORMONE BEEF?

“Hormone-boosted beef. Chlorine-washed chicken. Genetically changed vegetables. This is what they really want for us all,” warned Cabaret, standing before his majestic herd of free-range cattle. “In France, foods are about pleasure, about taste. But in the United States, these people put anything within their mouths. No, this has to be stopped.”In Europe, it is a season of angst - even paranoia - over a historic bid to link the United States and the 28-nation European Union in the world’s largest free-trade deal.

Passage of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) could be a globalisation milestone, creating a megamarket of 800 million consumers from Alaska to Finland, Hawaii to Greece. Import duties - many of which already are low - could be further reduced.
More significant, the deal could possibly finally tackle nontariff barriers, including differing data protection and food safety standards that have long stood in the form of transatlantic commerce.''

Leading European food safety authorities have determined that several US practices in contention -
for example sanitizing poultry in lightly chlorinated water - are safe. Yet increasingly, the controversy here is not just about wellness but what European critics decry as “less natural” methods deployed by mass producers of food in the usa.

But
even while time expires for President Barack Obama to sign an agreement before leaving office, European and United states advocates have been surprised at the increasingly hostile reception with this side from the Atlantic. It's jeopardizing the chances of an agreement that proponents say could create an incredible number of new work opportunities by dramatically boosting US-EU trade.
There's dissent in the United States, too, where some critics fear Washington may bargain away the “Buy American” clauses that provide United states companies an advantage in government legal contracts. But within Europe, no single issue is inflaming the debate a lot more than food - particularly US calls for The european countries to open it's door to long-banned American foodstuffs which are hormone-treated, chemically sanitized or even genetically modified.

Many European critics
are also taking focus on other aspects of the deal - with the most strident opponents insisting it could usher in an era of American-style capitalism to Europe that puts corporations and consumerism above all else.

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