The fifth round of U.S.-EU negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) took place in Arlington, Virginia from May 19-23, 2014. At the mid-point of negotiations, U.S. and EU negotiators hosted a stakeholder forum to provide an update to all interested stakeholders on the status of the negotiations and to solicit feedback. The forum consisted of two components – stakeholder policy presentations and a chief negotiator briefing. Chief U.S. Negotiator Dan Mullaney and Chief EU Negotiator Ignacio Garcia-Bercero also held a press conference at the conclusion of the negotiations.
During the 5th round, negotiators met in several key areas including regulatory coherence, intellectual property rights, labor, services, investment, technical barriers to trade, agricultural market access, and rules of origin. At the end of the round, Ambassador Froman issued a press release stating, “{w}e’ve moved from discussing a conceptual framework to defining specific ideas for addressing the majority of the negotiating areas. We are looking to advance the remaining areas soon. There is a lot of work ahead of us, but we are making steady progress and we have a firm understanding of the key issues that need to be resolved.”
For more information about the 5th round in general, and Ambassador Froman’s statement, click here. For more information about the stakeholder event, including a link to the speaker agenda, click here. Finally, for a copy of the transcript from the closing press conference, click here.
