EU-Mercosur Trade Deal: Europe’s Peasant Unions Accuse the European Commission of Ignoring Their Concerns

In a press release issued on Friday, December 6th, peasant and small-scale farming organizations, united under the European Coordination Via Campesina, condemned the European Commission and Mercosur leaders for concluding negotiations on the EU-Mercosur Free Trade Agreement (FTA). These organizations oppose the deal due to its social impact and its rejection of the need for sustainable food systems. The deal also contradicts the national governments’ commitments to combating climate change.

“As European farmers, we don’t want to compete with farmers from Mercosur. Our job is not to be in global competition but to produce healthy food for Europeans,” said Morgan Ody, a peasant farmer from Brittany, France, and the General Coordinator of La Via Campesina, in response to the decision to sign the deal.

Andoni Garcia from ECVC added, “We will now carefully observe what governments and political groups, who claimed during farmers’ historic mobilizations earlier this year to support farmers, will actually do. They must take a stand against this deal and this undemocratic process of negotiating trade agreements.”

Achieving food sovereignty and respecting peasants’ rights should form the basis for a new framework for international food exchanges, ensuring the trade system is fair and contributes to justice and peace.

Farmers will continue to mobilize against this trade deal and will, in one way or another, bring it to an end, reiterated ECVC in its press release.

Meanwhile, here is a short video compiling the concerns of peasant movements on both sides of the Atlantic.

This post is also available in Français.