U.S.-EU trade deal: Friends of the Earth decries efforts to weaken regulation of chemicals, fracking and food safety
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, the U.S. Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on negotiation of a U.S.-Europe trade deal, the so-called Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. The negotiating objectives for the TTIP agreement have little to do with free trade. TTIP negotiations instead focus on removing perceived regulatory “barriers” and could result in dangerous deregulation of environmental, climate, and public health safeguards. Erich Pica, President of Friends of the Earth, had these comments:
“Today’s hearing in the Senate Finance Committee reveals the true objectives of industry proponents of the EU-US trade deal — to destroy the progress we have made over the last decade in the EU and in states across the U.S. to protect human health from toxic chemicals, to undercut food safety measures on both sides of the Atlantic, and to chill government action to address global warming, including restrictions on curtailing hydraulic “fracking” for natural gas. TTIP could be a stealth attack on our health, our environment and our attempts to forestall climate catastrophe.”
Click here to read the statement on TTIP and toxic chemicals submitted to the Senate Finance Committee by the Center for International Environmental Law, Friends of the Earth, U.S, and Sierra Club.
Click here to read a TTIP policy analysis prepared by Friends of the Earth: see “Deregulatory disappointment: transatlantic free trade agreement negotiations”
Click here and read more in this blog post, “Chevron fracks Europe: Transatlantic trade and investment agreement favors big energy companies and threatens the environment”
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Contact:
William Waren, (202) 222-0746, [email protected]
Adam Russell, (202) 222-0722, [email protected]