Mairead McGuinness Fine Gael MEP

A report strongly condemning the EU Commission’s approach to trade agreements has just been passed (Tuesday, 8th March – noon) in the European Parliament with an overwhelming majority, according to Mairead McGuinness, Ireland East MEP and member of the Agricultural Committee who was involved in drawing up the report.

The Parliament condemns the Commission’s approach, which far too often makes concessions on agriculture to obtain enhanced market access in third countries for industrial products and services and calls on the Commission to stop putting agricultural interests behind the interests of the industrial and services sector.

McGuinness says the issue of agriculture and trade is highly sensitive. “There is a deep sense of frustration that the Commission is hell bent on sacrificing agriculture for trade in other areas, without any real concern about the direct impact of such an approach on EU agriculture, EU consumers, the environment and other issues.”

McGuinness said the Commission has a duty and a responsibility to listen to the concerns of MEPs. “In particular the Commission must take due account of the fact that the parliament considers it unacceptable that the Commission resumed negotiations with Mercosur without making publicly available a detailed impact assessment and without engaging in a proper political debate with the Council and Parliament.

“The Parliament also calls for a study into the impact of these negotiations on European agricultural sectors and regions to be produced and discussed before any tariff proposals are exchanged between the EU and Mercosur.”

The Parliament also calls on the Commission not to conclude the negotiations with Mercosur until the WTO round has been brought to a close, as stipulated in its mandate and to keep the Council and Parliament duly informed of developments in the negotiations with Mercosur and in future to inform Council and Parliament before such trade negotiations commence.

“Europe will sacrifice farming at its peril, agriculture is more important now than ever it was. Many of us are deeply concerned about the pace of the Mercosur talks and the unwillingness of the Commission to fully engage on agriculture concerns.

“Food products are not the same as cars and trucks – food security is important for the EU and any threat to our food production base must be resisted.

“The Commission also fails to take account of obligations to agriculture under the Treaty of Rome and the negative consequences for rural areas of the Commission push for a deal with Mercosur without a full impact assessment.

“Those of us who understand the agriculture and food sector are attempting to convince others of the seriousness of the situation for EU agriculture.

“For Irish beef production, any deal that might allow for 300,000 tonne quota for beef from the Mercosur countries would decimate our farm sector.

“The impact would be on the high value beef cuts which account for 25pc of the returns to produces. The Agricultural Committee fully supported my amendment to take account of this key concern,” she said.

“Today’s vote shows that the European Parliament is prepared to take account of the concerns of its key food producing sector and of its willingness to listen and understand the concerns of those facing economic disaster if a Mercosur deal goes ahead.

“For EU consumers the threat is also very real – EU food production standards are higher than in the Mercosur countries. We must not allow imports which do not meet our high standards.”