Mr. Barry Finnegan:

TTIP is the reverse of that. Let us not forget that in the US just four companies control the beef market, that three control the chicken market and that a further three control the mutton and lamb market. The objective of this trade agreement is to do the same. Having so many small farmers is viewed as inefficient. In order to have a capital-intensive industry, one must have a huge amount of money. Also, when animals are housed in unhygienic conditions they must be injected with an endless amount of antibiotics and hormones which costs a great deal of money. In addition, the end unit cost to produce a kilo of beef is much lower in America than it is here.

As far as the meat industry lobbyists and the American Government are concerned, the problem is our rules and regulations. Of course, the latter have led to high standards. The problem for the Americans is our high standards. The objective of TTIP is to sweep our high standards away and create one of two things. Either harmonisation where everybody comes down to the same level or recognition. That viewpoint has come straight from the European Commission and the negotiators and it is the stated objective. It is going to be one of two things, whether it is workers' rights, chemical regulation, food standards or animal husbandry standards. There is a possible twin-track and the US will go for one or the other. First, harmonisation would mean everybody ends up at the same level. Second, recognition would mean that Ireland would keep its high standards and the US would retain its low standards but we would recognise both. It would mean that the US could sell its capital-intensive, low-unit-cost and chemical-filled food products on our shelves and we could not ban such a move.

The US also objects to the testing of its foods. For example, if documentation for a container ship full of wheat states that the product is regular wheat and non-GMO then our inspectors can test to see if that statement is true. We have numerous examples of where wheat, meat products and other grains have been found to contain GMOs when, in fact, the producer had stated otherwise. Under the new agreement we will not be allowed to test such products anymore and no second test will be conducted. The idea behind this trade agreement is to reduce the cost to industry generated by having two sets of standards.

In America, there is what is called a scientific method. That involves a private company hiring the scientist, no peer review research, no sharing of data between scientists even those working in the same company and voluntary regulation whereby its Government does not carry out its own testing. We in Europe are expected to trust that a huge multi-billion dollar corporation has carried out all of the tests and told the truth when there is much evidence to the contrary which proves that products that ended up in Europe were not what was stated on their labels.

It is not about everything meeting EU standards; unfortunately, it is the absolute opposite. That is the reason there is such massive opposition from farmers' lobby groups, the Slow Food movement, Euro Toques and all those in the industry who are concerned about producing high quality food in Europe. They are up in arms because the explicit objective is harmonisation of standards and recognition. I will give one example that is related to standards and also employment.

In Europe there are 1,328 chemicals that have been banned from use in cosmetics because, as far as we are concerned, using the precautionary principle of science, we reckon they cause cancer and other heinous diseases. In America 11 chemicals are banned from use in cosmetics. Chemical-filled hair spray, mascara, lipstick or whatever else will be for sale on shelves here, but we will not be able to ban it. European food and cosmetic producers will then decide not to stay in Europe with its high standards and to move their capital to the United States and manufacture their product there and where wages, pay and conditions are lower and where regulation is exercised purely by the corporation, not by the government, and sell their product into Europe. Therefore, we will end up with fewer manufacturing jobs in a range of areas. The jobs will be moved to America where production will take place, more chemicals are used and from where product is sold into Europe without being regulated and tested.

This is what has happened all over the world with similar free trade agreements, the biggest being the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, under which agriculture in America was decimated and ten of thousands of jobs were lost. There has been a 236% increase in agricultural exports from Mexico to the United States and a huge reduction in American agricultural exports to Mexico. Those producing food in the United State when NAFTA came into force in 1995 shut up shop and stopped producing chickens and beef and moved across the border to Mexico where pay and conditions were lower and there were no government inspections. That is what we are talking about in this instance.

We need to recognise that those involved in the quality food industry, both in America and Europe, are speaking with one voice. In the United States small quality food producers, the high quality food trade unions and other civil society groups gave out stink about NAFTA in 1995 and everything they had said came true. They are still there 20 years later making exactly the same points about this trade deal. It is important to read what civil society has to say, get our head around the arguments we are making and burrow more deeply into the details of the Commission's documents and move past the marketing bumf in press releases.