In an attempt to obtain the green light of France on the agreement with Mercosur, Brussels released the safeguard measures card … without completely convincing Paris, which still requires “mirrors” to protect its farmers.
New step on the road to ratification, the European Commission has officially submitted to the Member States the text of the vast trade agreement between the European Union and the Mercosur countries of South America. In a gesture to Paris, which leads a Honda against the “in the current state” treaty, the European Executive added the promise of an additional “legal act” that activates safeguard measures, provided for in the text, to ensure sensitive agricultural sectors.
Considering itself a “new element” obtained “on the initiative of France”, the French Minister of Agriculture has been cautious with respect to the commitments of the European Commission. “I maintain the same position” on the EU-Mercosur agreement because “some of our agricultural sectors cannot [en] Being the adjustment variable, “said Annie Genevard on Wednesday night, for whom these” new guarantees “must” be in full functioning “and” applicable in the field. “
The insertion of “clause mirrors” in the text of the EU-Mercosur agreement is an old battle horse in France. Not rejecting the commercial agreement as such, when Donald Trump’s protectionist offensive and Europe seeks to diversify its points of sale, Paris has made it the sine condition that the treaty is acceptable to its eyes. If he considered it “strategically good,” Emmanuel Macron said he was still ready last June to sign the text if he included these famous “mirror clauses” in agricultural affairs.
Two different tools
According to French desires, these “mirror clauses” would avoid distortions of competition between the two Atlantic banks, avoiding export to Europe from South American agricultural productions that would not comply with European health, environmental and social standards, despite the fact that European farmers are subject to it. The entry of these agricultural products in the old continent would be conditioned to the fulfillment of European standards.
“The use of antibiotic growth promoters is still authorized in third countries, in particular those of Mercosur”, or “This practice, prohibited in the European Union since 2006, is not yet trusted effectively for the products imported in the EU,” said a report from the Foundation for Nature and Man, the interproveion of the French Bovine Sector (Interbev) and the Veglian Institute 2024. It is also mentioned in Europe, as well as certain agricultural practices prohibited in European soil.
In fact, the term “mirror clauses” is related to two different tools, although close. The “mirror measures” are provisions inserted in European regulations and that apply to all imports from outside the EU, regardless of the third country. This is, for example, the prohibition of animal products treated with growth hormones since the 2000s or the anti-deformity regulations that will be applied at the end of the year. But the list of “mirror measures” in agricultural affairs is very short today.
The “mirror clauses”, as such, designate similar provisions that only apply to a commercial agreement, after having been negotiated between the two parties for some specific products, this is what France affirms today within the framework of the EU-MERCOSUR Agreement. The commercial agreement between the EU and New Zealand, which entered into force in May 2024, thus inserted such a clause, excluding the beef of the fattening parks, a mainly symbolic provision, since these “streams” almost do not exist on the floor of New Zealand.
Difficult to implement
However, these mirror clauses are still difficult to implement. The traceability of agricultural production, even more for the productions of countries where the requirements are less strong, tracking from birth to sacrifice, within Mercosur, only exists in Uruguay, is not infallible. A European audit had revealed significantly insufficient controls of beef in Brazil, where the absence of the prohibited stradiol hormone in Europe is not guaranteed.
Other countries, including Poland and Italy, had also requested the addition of these mirror clauses in the text. But the European Commission has long closed the door to the insertion of mirror clauses in the text, which would have required a renegotiation with the Mercosur partners who oppose fiercely.
France has a good opportunity to lose in the archive of the mirrors clauses, while the horizon is clarified for the EU-Mercosur agreement. If you always oppose the text in the current state, France will need to gather a “locking minority”, at least four member states that represent more than 35% of the EU population, to block their commercial appearance. Poland has reiterated its refusal, but Paris and Warsaw seem isolated in Europe. Italy, doubtful, finally softened his position.
Source: BFM TV
