The National Milk Producers Federation on Wednesday endorsed the U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer’s new list of European dairy exports that will now face higher tariffs, including cheeses, yogurt and butter, as part of $7.5 billion in retaliation tariffs against the European Union after the World Trade Organization ruled that EU subsidies on behalf of the Airbus airplane violate WTO rules.

NMPF said, “The U.S. is running a $1.6 billion dairy trade deficit with Europe because of unfair EU trade practices that block our access to their market while they enjoy broad access to ours.

“Trade authorities should also address one particularly egregious example of EU trade practices: the EU’s abusing the use of geographical indications to limit competition from cheese exporters in the U.S. that use common food names. Rather than compete head-to-head with high-quality, American-made foods by allowing the use of common food names to coexist alongside GIs relating to those products, Europe instead blocks sales of these everyday food products from the United States and aggressively pressures other countries to do the same.

“The retaliatory tariffs announced today are a clarion call for fair trade and an indication that trade must be a two-way trade. What better way to reduce the U.S. trade deficit with Europe than by selling them award-winning U.S. cheeses?”