EU, US join forces to ensure food security, access to fertilizer

The conflict in Ukraine has curbed world entry to staple crops and fertilizers and despatched commodity costs up.

The brand new cooperation between the USA and European Union will likely be a part of the Commerce and Know-how Council arrange by each allies to strengthen their financial ties [File: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg]

The European Union and the US are planning to launch a brand new platform to deal with the safety of meals provides and agricultural commodities because the conflict in Ukraine curbs world entry to staple crops and fertilizers from the area.

As many international locations are going through meals safety points, “there may be clearly a necessity for finest align approaches to help these international locations because the EU and US are main gamers and worldwide donors,” Valdis Dombrovskis, the EU’s commerce chief, mentioned in a Friday interview.

The 2 international locations will even have a look at provide chain diversification, notably for fertilizers. Since each Russia and Belarus are main exporters, “there are clearly disruptions and we have to see how we're diversifying the availability,” Dombrovskis mentioned.

The brand new cooperation will likely be a part of the Commerce and Know-how Council arrange by each allies to strengthen their financial ties. Senior officers will meet on Sunday and Monday in Paris to deepen their cooperation on fields together with export controls, semiconductors and procurement.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Commerce Consultant Katherine Tai plan to attend from the US facet. Dombrovskis, Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s digital affairs chief, in addition to the top of inside markets, Thierry Breton, will signify the EU.

Though the EU is just not going through a serious meals safety disaster, Dombrovskis mentioned, “we face meals affordability points” that could possibly be tackled within the new platform.

As a part of the brand new discussion board, the European Fee additionally needs to deal with the proliferation of export restrictions to make sure that there are adequate agri-food commodities, particularly for growing nations. However either side are usually not anticipated to debate the billions of euros that they supply to their farmers respectively to help manufacturing of their territory.