“I grew up on American food. That’s the last thing Europe needs.”
As the European Commission is tempted to relax its agricultural import rules to please Donald Trump, Guardian columnist Alexander Hurst is protesting. For him, who lives in France after growing up in Ohio, such an idea is unacceptable, both for environmental and cultural reasons.
As the European media keep repeating, the EU is "under pressure" : it must submit an agreement to the United States before the July 9 deadline to try to avoid the unilateral tariff increase promised by Trump. Fine, but what can Europe put on the table? In early May [the 1st ], European Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic suggested offering Americans the right to buy more of their agricultural products. A proposal that still seems to be on the table, even though Sefcovic has since clarified that the EU has no plans to change its health and safety standards.
For my part, I am convinced that if we agree to put more American food on our plates, we risk leaving the table with indigestion. No, let's not give in to Trump's trade blackmail. We don't play with food!
“Europeans don’t want American chicken. They don’t want American lobsters. They hate our beef because it’s fantastic and theirs is miserable,” quipped U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in April. Joking aside, every time I return to the U.S., I become a vegetarian throughout my trip—even though the vegetables sold in American stores are
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