Failure to agree a world trade deal and return to protectionism would empty our supermarket shelves, push up our household budgets, and impoverish our families, the EU ambassador to the US, John Bruton, warned last night.
Saying that both the US and the EU needed the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to work, he said the upward trend in prices being paid to farmers for milk and grain mean they may have less to fear from changes in the WTO talks.
Contrasting EU and US farm policy shifts, he said the EU has already reformed the Common Agricultural Policy and has switched to fully decoupled direct payments. The US has done the direct opposite.
"What is now under discussion in the US Congress for the next farm Bill will not lead to any kind of substantial reforms in US agricultural policy in the coming years, unless agreement is reached at WTO level," he said.
Delivering the Michael Dillon Memorial Lecture in Dublin, the former taoiseach said the EU and US combined currently constitute 12 per cent of the world's population, enjoy 62 per cent of the world's income and consume over 40 per cent of the world's energy. Africa and China account for 34 per cent of the world's population, but enjoy only 6.5 per cent of the world's income.