Brussels – Even with a new prime minister, France will continue to stonewall to prevent the free trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur, South America’s common market, effectively stalled for a quarter century, from getting off the ground. Michel Barnier, the conservative President Emmanuel Macron appointed to head the transalpine executive, aims to build a bloc minority at the Council. And he may succeed, much to the chagrin of those who hope to conclude negotiations in the coming months.
It is twenty-five years since, back in 1999, negotiations were started to enter into the trade agreement between two of the world’s largest economic blocs, the European Union and the Mercosur—a Spanish acronym for “Common Market of the South” and designating a free trade area created in 1991 in South America, which includes Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay (Venezuela was suspended in 2016) and with which the other states in the area are also associated (Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru).
After particularly complex negotiations lasting two decades, the agreement had been concluded as a general principle in June 2019. Still, its ratification (for which a unanimous vote in the Council and the green light from the national parliaments of the Twenty-seven are needed) has been in mothballs since then due to opposition from some European countries and former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. If it goes into effect, it would involve over 780 million consumers on both sides of the Atlantic and do away with about 93 per cent of the tariffs imposed by Brussels.
However, it does not look like the agreement can get off the ground anytime soon, at least not in its current formulation. Some hoped a breakthrough could come by November 18–19, when the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro will be held. To the contrary, at least according to what was stated in the last days by Assemblée nationale deputy Pascal Lecamp (whose party, MoDem, is part of the liberal coalition backing Macron), both the French premier and president “are in favour of finding a blocking minority to prevent the signing of the treaty.” With a blocking minority, the Council could revoke the negotiating mandate given to the European Commission.
Preventing it from proceeding with the stipulation would constitute “a priority” for Barnier, who, according to Lecamp, would be “very attached to the mirror clauses,” i.e., rules that would bind Mercosur participating countries to the same environmental and social standards to which the EU member states are subject. In short, without rules on the reciprocity of these commitments, on which Paris has long insisted, France’s signature is virtually impossible. In the words of Antoine Vermorel-Marques, deputy of the Républicains (Barnier’s conservative party), the agreement is “deadlocked”.
Opposition from the transalpine government is certainly not new. Still, the EU Commission itself had recently slowed down on the agreement to meet the demands of farmers who had organized a series of protests across Europe earlier this year. In early September, however, 11 member countries (including Germany and Spain) sent a letter to the EU executive asking it to press on the accelerator. Last week, the Brazilian government said it had made “significant progress” in negotiations with its European counterparts. He was confident that an agreement could be reached by the end of the year—but he may have claimed victory too soon.
English version by the Translation Service of Withub
