Francie Gorman has said that without ratification the EU-Mercosur trade is not a ‘done deal’.

The Irish Farmers Association (IFA) president and vice-president of the Committee of Professional Agricultural Organisations (COPA) was discussing the Mercosur deal with Olof Gill, the spokesperson for the European Commission for trade, on Clare Byrne Live on Thursday.

The trade deal with Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay was given the green light after European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen travelled to a trade summit South America in early December.

However, Gorman said since the deal is not yet ratified, there could still be changes to the agreement.

“The deal is not done; no vote has taken place on this yet and I know from the opposition to this, through COPA, through every member state, every farm organisation is against this.”

Imports

A European Union (EU) delegation is set to travel to Ireland in early 2025 to discuss the trade agreement with political, agricultural and business representatives.

The current proposal will see 99,000t - 1.6% of EU production - of South American beef enter the European market at a much lower tariff, which will be phased in over seven years.

Olof Gill also confirmed that beef imported from Mercosur will be clearly labelled as produced in South America.

Gorman added that von der Leyen did not make this agreement from a strong position.

“We didn’t even know she was going; this was done in the dark of night. She arrived over there to seal a deal, Olof says from a strong negotiating position, that’s not how you negotiate in a strong manner.

“You wouldn’t send someone, if Mountrath Mart was open, to buy cattle for you on that basis.”

Trade deal

The proposed deal has set out safeguarding measures to protect farmers if there are market disturbances and all imported products will have to comply with EU food safety regulations.

Gill said that previous deals show that this will be profitable to farmers and businesses.

“South American beef, in certain numbers, is already in the EU market - what this deal does is give them a slightly larger market share according to very strict conditions,” he said.

“When the EU-Canada agreement was agreed around seven or eight years ago, we heard the same thing that it was going to decimate our beef sector. In fact, the exact opposite happened; no increase market share to Canadian imports into the EU and in fact we increased our food exports to Canada.”