CETA, Italian government approves ratification and transposition of transatlantic free trade agreement. With nefarious effects.
Silent maneuvers
Between the lines of the copious government press release of May 24, 2017 (1) lurks the news that ‘the Council of Ministers, at the proposal of Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Angelino Alfano, approved a bill to ratify and implement (…) the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement between Canada, on the one hand, and the European Union and its member states, on the other hand, with annexes, defined in Brussels on Oct. 30, 2016, and the related joint interpretative instrument.‘
Under the deafening silence of regime newspapers
– distracting readers with debates on compulsory vaccines and electoral reform-the Italian government gave the green light to CETA
. An all-encompassing treaty that, as we have already denounced
, betrays any protection hitherto accorded to Made in Italy food production.
.
CETA, avalanche on Made in Italy
Beginning with the Stresa Convention
of 1951, on ‘
the use of designations of origin and names of cheeses
‘ (2)-through the Common Market Organization and the schemes for the protection of Geographical Indications
(3) – countries on the old continent have tried their hand at safeguarding characteristic agrifood production. By establishing special production specifications, tied to territories and traditions, and recognizing exclusive rights to use the respective Geographical Indications.
In the name of the transatlantic ‘partnership’
, those who claim to represent Europe’s interests have given up protecting its traditional products
. To the point of settling for a partial and unrealistic recognition of 41 PDOs and PGIs out of 291, as far as Italy is concerned. But that is not all.
Risks to food safety and animal welfare
Food safety and animal welfareas well as public health, worker and environmental protection, have achieved the highest standards of assurance in Europe. Thanks to enormous efforts and investments on the public and private sides, which are now being sacrificed in turn On the altar of neoliberalism.
Take the example of meats
. Italian animal husbandry 4.0
, with the Charter of Padua
, proposes that Europe align digital records with its own level. To ensure real-time availability of animal and electronic medical records, health conditions and treatments, and welfare of individual animals. Promoting the proper use of medicines, within the already narrow range of authorized active ingredients, and pharmaco-vigilance.
The example of meats, chlorine hormones and cloning
Across the Atlantic, the situation
is, so to speak, ‘a little different’:
– hygiene deficiencies
in poultry farms find extreme remedy in washing carcasses with chlorine solutions
,
–
the hormones
synthetic
are systematically applied to so-called farm animals, which are also ‘doped’ with drugs whose use has been banned in Europe for decades, (4)
–
cloning
is devoid of rules on registration and labeling, so that meat
derived from the offspring of cloned animals can be freely placed on the market without anyone’s knowledge.
The dumping
health
– as well as environmental and on workers’ rights – will therefore affect not only our supply chains, but also the health of consumers that the European legislator had until now taken care to ensure.
As we wait to see
what those in the seats of Montecitorio and Palazzo Madama, to whom the bill to approve CETA has been forwarded, will do, let us prepare to
resist
.
Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) Cf. http://www.governo.it/articolo/comunicato-stampa-del-consiglio-dei-ministri-n-31/7447
(2) V.
https://www.admin.ch/opc/it/classified-compilation/19510137/200503290000/0.817.142.1.pdf
(3) Italy ranks first in Europe in terms of recognition of traditional agri-food products (with 291 between PDO, PGI, STG) and typical wines (with 523 DOCG, DOC, IGT)
(4) Anabolic substances such as cortisone drugs and ‘β-agonists,’ e.g., ractopamine. Consumption of meat from animals treated with anabolic steroid hormones is associated with alterations in the reproductive systems of individuals consuming them and their offspring. As documented in several scientific studies. V. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
