A Franco-Polish alliance within the EU has this week secured import restrictions on Ukrainian products after months of grassroots protests from European farmers.
Farmers have been protesting against the rapid liberalisation of trade with Ukraine since the start of Russia’s invasion of the country in 2022, which has resulted in cheap Ukrainian products undercutting prices.
According to Politico, France and Poland pushed for greater restrictions on Ukrainian poultry, eggs, sugar, and wheat, with the deal likely to be rubber-stamped shortly in the European Parliament. The French position on Ukraine has shifted in recent weeks because of farmer protests, leading to President Emmanuel Macron dropping previous support for Mercosur, a free-trade agreement between the EU and South America, as a sign of leaders belatedly listening to farmers’ concerns.
The question of how to integrate Ukrainian agriculture into the relatively sheltered European common market has been a major bone of contention during the war; the Ukrainian agricultural sector is synonymous with overproduction and is dominated by various oligarchal interests.
In remarks to The European Conservative, EU agricultural commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski was still positive about the future integration of the Ukrainian agricultural sector into the EU, with the caveat that Brussels should “avoid the situation where European subsidies are spent for the oligarchs” written into the fine print of any treaty.
The emergency decision to suspend tariffs on Ukrainian goods in 2022 has not only been criticised by farming groups but also by Ukranian civic society groups who have warned that the unexpected trade liberalisation was enriching multiple agricultural oligarchs by allowing them easy access to the EU market without proper oversight.
Despite the import restrictions being welcomed by farming groups as a concession to save the livelihoods of millions of farmers, establishment sources such as Politico were quick to lament, “Vladimir Putin can rely on European agri-food groups to do his lobbying for him.”
The decision comes ahead of a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels this week where the issue of Ukrainian accession will be discussed amid speculation that Eurocrats will have to cut the EU’s system of farming subsidies (the Common Agricultural Policy, CAP) to facilitate Kyiv’s entry into the EU.
While supportive of the Ukrainian cause, Wojciechowski was clear that the country would likely go through a lengthy transition period before being allowed to enter the EU. The commissioner’s own country, Poland, experienced numerous agrarian protests just this month regarding cheap Ukrainian wheat imports.
More broadly, the EU is grappling with the effects of turbulent geopolitics and its traditional policies of protected and sustainable agriculture, as well as the green deal, as Eurocrats announced the imposition of tariffs on Russian and Belarussian wheat imports following protests from farmers in Eastern Europe and the Baltics.
