“It had all seemed so settled, over and done. Now an issue that everyone thought was closed is open for debate again.”

Viewer of Webdebate in online comments 

In 2020, there was concern in American agricultural circles and at the highest levels of the U.S. Department of Agriculture about draft “Farm-to-Fork” agricultural policies of the European Union.

The COVID lockdown was in full force, one of several factors that were making free public discussion difficult. We were asked to find a means of opening up the debate, so American concerns could be heard.

As a result of our work in the E.U., we had excellent relations with European parliamentary groups that shared the American concerns. Partnering with the European Conservatives and Reformists Party (ECR Party), we conceived, organized, and produced , the first US-EU public debate on agricultural policy to address the official announcement in May 2020 of the Farm-to-Fork proposals.

Working with a number of key players in the U.S. and the E.U. we staged a trans-Atlantic webinar debate.

The web-based debate brought together Sonny Perdue, US Secretary of Agriculture; Janusz Wojciechowski, EU Commissioner for Agriculture; Anna Fotyga, Member of European Parliament & Acting President of the ECR Party; Hermann Tertsch, MEP, Spain; Jon Entine, Founder and Executive Director, Genetic Literacy Project; Richard Milsom, Executive Director, ECR Party.

Thanks to the ECR Party’s efforts, promotion throughout the EU and in the UK was extensive and targeted policymakers, the European agricultural community, and journalists.

Held on July 29, 2020, the livestream drew several thousand views, many of them journalists, leading to high profile stories in media across the continent, including in Politico (two articles and a short preview item the morning of), EurActiv (republished in EurActiv Germany), EU News, the ECR’s online journal New Europe, as well as science, business, agriculture and food policy outlets. 

The webinar’s immediate impact was to reopen discussion in Brussels and a number of national capitals.