TACD leaders meeting, Brussels, 14-15 September 2000

The Steering Committee, Working Groups Chairs and experts of the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue held high-level discussions with the European Commission and US Government.

On Thursday 14 September, they met Commissioner Byrne and discussed the latest developments in several top consumer issues including the Precautionary Principle and Alternative Dispute Resolution in Electronic Commerce. On Friday 15 September, Anthony Wayne, US Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs, Agne Pantelouri, Acting Director for Consumer Policy at DG Health and Consumer Policy, and Richard Morningstar, US Ambassador to the European Union led the official delegations and addressed the participants in the opening session.

TACD held in depth discussions on trade, ecommerce, health and food issues in parallel working groups with representatives of the European Commission and the USGovernment. Issues adressed in these meetings included Biotechnology, Precautionary Principle,Food labelling;Alternative Dispute Resolution and Jurisdiction on Cross Boredr Transactions, Co-Regulation and Codes of Conduct, Data Privacy and the Safe Harbor Agreement; Access to Medicines, Data Exclusivity and Health registration Data; Transparency in WTO, Services.