José Manuel Fernandes, Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries
It encompasses 750 million people and about a fifth of the world economy. If the pact is signed, Portugal could see customs duties on olive oil and wine reduced. The problem is meat, which is making the French angry.
Currently, trade between the European Union and Mercosur countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and Venezuela and other associates) is reduced, with the number of imports in 2023 being around 53.7 billion euros.
At the beginning of the month, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced the world’s largest trade pact between the two organizations. However, the draft text was blocked by France and other countries that oppose the agreement. Above all, the meat is at stake.
The European Union has very strict standards when it comes to food safety, and Macron says that signing a pact with Mercosur countries, which do not have to respect these rules and are therefore able to use hormones, growth promoters and pesticides that cannot be used in Europe. It would therefore be “unfair competition”, guarantee the French.
However, as explained by , French concerns are not so necessary: experts say that, since agricultural products produced in the EU find millions of new consumers in Mercosur countriesthe agricultural sector in general benefits from the agreement.
Furthermore, one published by the European Commission states that under the new agreement, the E.U. will import 99,000 tons of beef with reduced duties of 7.5%. This figure represents just 1.6% of total beef production in the EU.
A Ireland, the fifth largest meat exporter in the world, must oppose also to the agreement, followed by Italy, Poland, Belgium and, possibly, the Netherlands and Austria.
As for Portugal, the agreement can be quite advantageous, especially when it comes to olive oil and wine.
Currently, Portugal has in Mercosur countries only 1.5% of the total percentage of exportsa residual number. But, with the new agreement, this could change.
According to, products such as wine and olive oil suffer customs duties of up to 40%. With the agreement, they should even disappear.
José Manoel FernandesMinister of Agriculture, told me Brussels that “Mercosur is an opportunity. There are more than 720 million consumers. These are democracies that come together, that defend values and that share. It’s a challenge for both parties, but one where both parties can win.”
“The objective is that no one loses, the objective is for there to be a ‘win-win’. We cannot be afraid. This is an opportunity that poses challenges, yes. Challenges that together we have an obligation to overcome. I am absolutely convinced that it will be a challenge that we will overcome”, added the minister.
The president of the Confederation of Farmers of Portugal, Álvaro Mendonça e Moura, says that “”the great positive aspect is that the European Union has been systematically losing market share in Mercosur. It is now just over half of what it was 15 years ago. The one who has benefited from this is China. We need to compensate for that. That’s the first point.”
“Second point: with regard to Portugal, we will have very important potential gains with the agreement in two sectors, olive oil and wine, which will see disappear customs fees. These are two sectors in which the country has surplus and where it intends to grow exports. As for what is worrying, it is essentially the beef and meat imports beef”, explains Mendonça e Moura.
“It is important that it is in the written agreement, and it will be, that if there is, or if there may be, signs of disturbance in the market, the agreement is suspended. This guarantee is very, very important for Portuguese producers. In the beef sector we will need to pay attention and the Government will have to compensate producers in case of disruption”, he tells CNN.
“On the other hand, if South American exporters, from Mercosur, do not comply with the calls phytosanitary rules applied to EU producerscontrol must also be tight. Apart from this, this attention that will be necessary, the agreement is positive, frankly positive”, he says.
Overall, it points to “huge opportunities” for the Portuguese economy with the pact.
“For example in olive oil, which has a customs duty of 10%. Also in wine, whose customs tax goes up to 38%. In cheese it is 26%. We, Portugal, with Mercosur have an agri-food deficit of 517 million euros every year. I am convinced that we will reduce this deficit. AND Brazil is one of the targets. We cannot forget that it is a market with 217 million people, it is almost half of the population of the European Union, and has a historic relationship with us.”
These opportunities only exist, of course, if France does not block the pact, and the EU and Mercosur join hands, more than two decades of negotiations later.
