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President Trump wants countries to buy more American chicken. That's just one of the issues to surface in an escalating global trade war. NPR's Will Stone explains why.
WILL STONE, BYLINE: For decades, Europe has been at odds with the U.S. over chicken, and politicians overseas are not jumping at President Trump's challenge. Here's what Darren Jones, chief secretary to the U.K.'s Treasury, had to say recently during an interview on Sky News.
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DARREN JONES: I think we can get a good deal on both sides.
UNIDENTIFIED COMMENTATOR: You can't have - you can't both have chlorinated chicken and not have chlorinated chicken.
JONES: And I've been really clear that we are not having chlorinated chicken in the U.K.
STONE: That's right - chlorinated chicken. It's become a sort of buzzword over the years. In the late '90s, the European Union placed a ban on poultry meat that had been rinsed with disinfectants, including chlorine. Using chlorine was once common in the U.S. for preventing sources of foodborne illness like salmonella and campylobacter. But it turns out times have changed.
DIANNA BOURASSA: The vast majority of chicken processed in the United States is not chilled in chlorine and hasn't been for quite a few years.
STONE: Dianna Bourassa is an applied poultry microbiologist at Auburn University. She says now poultry processors primarily use an organic acid, known as peroxyacetic or peracetic acid - basically a mixture of vinegar and hydrogen peroxide.
BOURASSA: It extends shelf life. It very significantly reduces the number of bacteria on chicken carcasses.
STONE: This has let the U.S. export poultry to other countries that prohibit chlorine, but not the EU and U.K. They don't allow any chemical washing. While it may be a perception issue for consumers, the chemicals themselves are not the primary concern. Regulators in Europe and the U.S. have concluded they don't pose a danger. Sarah Sorscher says it's more what those chemicals represent.
SARAH SORSCHER: Are these really a Band-Aid that's covering up some deeper issues with the food safety practices in the industry?
STONE: Sorscher is with the consumer advocacy group, the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
SORSCHER: Our hygiene practices are essentially - in their minds - inadequate.
STONE: And she thinks Europe has a point here.
SORSCHER: If U.S. producers really want to compete with Europe, they should think about elevating their food safety practices.
STONE: But others in this field disagree. Byron D. Chaves is a food microbiologist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
BYRON D CHAVES: I would be very cautious about pushing that narrative.
STONE: He says, fundamentally, the regulations are different. Europe relies on preharvest interventions.
CHAVES: Preharvest means when the animal is still alive - things like vaccination and different types of additives that are used in feed.
STONE: The U.S., on the other hand, focuses more on interventions after the chicken is slaughtered. Chaves says it's difficult to compare the U.S. and Europe on foodborne illnesses linked to poultry because of differences in how the data are collected. His view?
CHAVES: The bottom line is that salmonella and campylobacter continue to be significant foodborne pathogens on both sides of the ocean.
STONE: Neither approach, he says, is 100% effective at eliminating this risk. Will Stone, NPR News.
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