With an announcement expected this afternoon on a trade deal between the US and UK, there has been speculation that the UK has made concessions on beef imports to get the deal over the line.

If that turns out to be the case, the detail is important.

Up to now, the UK government has been adamant that there will be no change in its position on food standards which means that the government would not accept hormone-fed beef or chlorine-washed chicken.

If, as part of a deal, the UK government conceded on this, it would have crossed a major red line that would cause an outcry with UK consumers as well as farmers.

With both countries keen to get a trade deal done, concessions are inevitable.

Policy shift

However, for the UK to accept hormone-fed beef as part of the deal some preparing of the ground for such a policy shift would be expected.

There has been no indication of this and indeed Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been quoted on the BBC saying that food standards will not feature in the deal - giving the example of chlorinated chicken.

There is another way that the UK could make a concession to the US on beef without compromising its position on hormones.

It could choose to give a generous tariff-free quota for US beef entering the UK that comes from cattle that haven’t been fed hormones.

There is a small market for hormone-free beef in the US and the UK could be generous in giving a quota for this product just as it did in previous trade deals with Australia and New Zealand.

CETA agreement

The EU, of which the UK was then a member, created something of a precedent for such an approach in the CETA agreement with Canada back in 2016.

Then a 50,000-tonne tariff-free quota was agreed for hormone-free beef. While Canada signed up for this at the time, it has complained about it since. It is such an issue with Canadian farmers that the Canadian government refused to sign a trade deal with the UK unless the UK changed their position on hormone-fed beef.