ECVC farmers from Belgian, France, Germany, and the Netherlands will join civil society actors this Thursday at 5pm in Place du Luxembourg in Brussels to call for an end to the EU-Mercosur FTA. This FTA, alongside the EU-US trade deal and proposed CAP’s dismantling, represent successive attacks by the European Commission on farmers income and rights in recent months. Despite promises to address low income and prices for farmers and agricultural workers, the European Commission is pushing policies that will slash both farmers market income and public aid at the same time, in fact deepening the crises in the agricultural sector.

The EU-Mercosur FTA threatens farmers livelihoods and right to a decent income as it will substantially increase unfair competition, flooding European markets with products that cost less to produce, with no regard for the risks to European strategic independence or the stability of the European food production system, nor to the environment and health, social and working conditions on both sides of the Atlantic.

The FTA abandons farmers for agribusiness and other industries, asking farmers to pay the price for the growth of other sectors. This logic totally ignores the unique and essential nature of food production – at the very core of our survival – and the fact that 36% of agricultural jobs were lost between 2005 and 2020. Short-term profits in other sectors will damage the Europe’s food system and people in irrevocable ways, a price which the European Commission are hoping to ignore until it’s too late.

The EU-US trade deal and the proposed CAP’s dismantling are yet further examples of the Commission’s shortsightedness and lack of strong strategic leadership in the face of huge challenges in Europe. From opening the European market to tariff-free, low quality, environmentally damaging, and even unsafe products in the EU-US deal, to the proposal to cut the CAP budget and renationalise support for farmers, the European Commission is actively taking steps that will further destroy EU farming and farmers when it should be taking dramatic steps to protect European food production.

We therefore call on every EU Member State and on all MEPs to reject and block this Free Trade Agreement. The European Commission must not be allowed to deconstruct European agriculture piece by piece via proposals that in fact protect the interests of private actors and third countries that the Commission is too weak to stand up to. Farmers will not be fooled by the thinly veiled egoistic objectives behind these deals and agreements and demands farmers’ incomes and livelihoods to be treated as a priority, for the wellbeing of Europe’s citizens: Stop EU-Mercosur, stop the EU-US deal, stop CAP’s dismantling.

Join ECVC farmers and CSOs in Place du Luxembourg at 5pm on Thursday 4 September.