EU food Luddites look like loser in deal with Trump

Politico:

Brussels is ready to offer to speed up the approval process for genetically modified organisms imported into the EU, as part of a mini trade agreement with Washington.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants to strike such a deal with U.S. President Donald Trump by March 18. POLITICO spoke with four diplomats and three EU officials who said that as part of the deal, the EU could commit to accelerating its system of checks and approvals for GMOs — a system Washington alleges was designed to arbitrarily slow down the approval of crops that compete with EU products.

Many EU countries have banned their farmers from growing genetically modified plants, but the EU does allow imports of GMOs grown abroad, such as soy, maize and sugar beet, which can be sold in Europe as food, animal feed, or both. However, each new variant must go through a lengthy approval process. Spanish farmers are the EU's main growers of GM crops.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative stated in a report on EU trade barriers last year that “the lengthy EU approval process" for GMO crops of "on average 7.5 years" has caused U.S. farmers "an annual loss of approximately $2 billion per year.”

Two officials said the U.S. wanted Europe to change the system so that approvals for new GMOs would be granted within two years. That would be in line with a commitment from China in its recent "Phase 1" trade agreement with Trump.

EU officials and diplomats reckoned the bloc could do that without changing its laws. "We won't change our regulations," one official said.
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You would think they would notice that this food is not killing Americans.  GMO foods are the result of efforts to increase crop yields and fight against disease and insect damage.  They have also resulted in improved results in other countries.