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*EU Consumer Commissioner, Meglena Kuneva, the US Chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, Nancy Nord, and the Chinese vice-Minister of AQSIQ, Wei Chuanzhong, met today in Brussels for the first high-level trilateral summit on product safety. * The high level meeting is intended to send a strong political signal of the determination of all sides to keep product safety at the top of the international political agenda, recognising that open markets can only be built on strong and secure management of global product supply chains. The tripartite meeting will step up EU-China-US cooperation.

First, a revised Memorandum of Understanding strengthening bilateral cooperation between the EU and China to enforce product safety standards and strengthen cooperation and exchange of information on food safety will be signed by Commissioner Kuneva, Commissioner Vassiliou and Vice-Minister Wei prior to the high level meeting.

Then, trilateral priority areas for action will be agreed and set out in the joint press statement, including on product traceability, cooperation by all three parties on safety standards, expertise exchange and joint enforcement actions.

Finally, discussions will focus on action to strengthen information exchange between the partners on alerts and recalls - in particular using new US product safety legislation which will allow more open information exchange on product recalls and dangerous products. Today's activities are part of a broader Product Safety Week, which is being hosted by the Commission from 17-21 November.

Commissioner Kuneva said: “Trust is the currency of the global economy. There is no room for complacency, and every week there are alerts which remind us that we must never allow safety issues to slip from the very top of the political agenda.

"This high level product safety summit sends a very clear signal about the determination of leaders in Europe, China and the US to put the safety of citizens first and to keep up the political momentum to insist that standards are high and fully enforced at every step along the global supply chain.

"We are strongly in favour of open and competitive markets, with all the benefits in terms of price and choice they bring for millions of consumers, but never at the expense of safety."