The debate on Mercosur takes place this Tuesday, November 26, 2024 in the National Assembly and the next day in the Senate. Debates followed by a vote, more symbolic than anything else. An idea submitted by Matignon, as a message of appeasement sent to farmers whose anger has not ceased. Vincent Louault, the senator of Indre-et-Loire, is the guest of France Bleu Touraine.
France Bleu Touraine – You said a few days ago “Mercosur, if ratified, will cause France to explode”. We can say that you don't pull any punches…
Vincent Louault – I believe that the situation of farmers, if we look in the department at the sunflowers, the corn which are still in the fields, the fields which have been seriously damaged following silage and harvests, the wheat which has not finished sowing. We don't really realize what is happening in France, with agriculture which is failing. So, it started about fifteen years ago, but the decline in agriculture means that for farmers, ratifying Mercosur in the coming months will really be the straw that breaks the camel's back.
You have signed, like all the parliamentarians of Indre-et-Loire, a forum which calls on Europe not to ratify this treaty. You don't see any advantage to this agreement?
Mercosur is a complex agreement begun in 1991, which has evolved over the years with the entry of some countries and the exit of others. Technically, the Mercosur agreement is quite a good agreement. This is obvious when we talk about dairy products, when we talk about industry, services, metro trains, etc. It's a pretty good deal. There is a very big difference with CETA, the free trade treaty with Canada, where you can import a lot of beef, but Canadians are not in a position to export to us beef without growth hormones and antibiotics. Brazil is not the same song at all. Brazil is truly an agri-food giant which will have the capacity to produce without these products banned in Europe. And so we are going to have a large quantity, 400,000 tonnes of meat and particularly very good cuts, which could unbalance the European market. Farmers have lost their economic profitability. Farmers in a good financial situation could have accepted Mercosur because we are talking about 1 or 2% of the volume of meat produced in Europe impacted by this treaty, so it is not huge either. But today, the situation of cattle breeders is such that you cannot tell them “You are dying in France, we are going to open the floodgates and import from other countries, notably Mercosur”.
So for you, it is first a matter of dealing with the problems of our farmers in France before making this type of agreement with abroad?
Quite. Today, we have a European Union which is losing ground in the agricultural sector with two giants which can produce almost in place of Europe. If you make an agreement with Mercosur and a quasi-free trade agreement with Ukraine as a war effort, all production can be exchanged by these two countries. You can well imagine French and European agricultural producers saying to themselves “does Europe still want farmers on its territory, apart from very high-end agriculture?”. And today, we clearly see that 80% of chicken, excluding home consumption, is imported from outside France.
There is something that comes up in the debates and that you cited, it is these health standards which are different between South America and what we apply in France. There are what we also call mirror clauses, that is to say applying our standards in Mercosur countries. Could this be a good idea?
Mirror clauses are a bit of mythology. Because in international trade, you can refuse what enters Europe based on a proven health difference, that is to say a level of antibiotics in the meat, a level of hormones in the meat, a level of pesticides in cereals. If the cereals come in, whatever their method of production, with nothing as residue, you cannot refuse international trade. These have been the major bases of international trade for 50 years. This prevents you from closing your borders to sort out your personal affairs and automatically there are retaliatory measures. We see it with the Chinese. You ban cars from entering Europe, the Chinese close their imports for a whole bunch of products, notably French, armagnac and cognac. So you see the complexity.
Let's say things clearly. There is this vote in the Assembly, then in the Senate. But this agreement will be decided at European level. Does it really serve any purpose?
Already, the President of the Republic in the Council of Europe has the possibility of using his right of veto, which would lead to a desire on the part of the European Commission to split the agreement in two and no longer need to go through this vote . But here, we need a European blocking minority in the Commission, therefore plus three countries which represent more than 35% of Europe's inhabitants to block the agreement. Today, we have countries that agree with us and there are countries that do not agree with us. You know, France is very isolated because the dropout from the France farm is Franco-French. Our problems come from a Europe which is not sufficiently accomplished, already a very strong distortion of competition between Poland, Germany, France and at the end of the farmers who are stuck in an economic context which is very unfavorable in France with super-standards.
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