Strasbourg, by our correspondent – “Against a backdrop of growing geopolitical tensions, nationalism and protectionism, the European Union remains a reliable and enduring partner.” These are the celebratory words of the Chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on International Trade, Bernd Lange (S&D), welcoming the vote that gave the final approval to the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) reform. The trade instrument aimed at supporting growth in developing countries was approved in yesterday’s plenary session (28 April) with 459 votes in favour, 127 against, and 70 abstentions. According to the German socialist, it represents “good news for over 2 billion people in more than 60 countries, who will benefit for a further 10 years from reduced or zero tariff preferences granted unilaterally by the EU.”
In short, the GSP is a scheme which, since 1971, has enabled emerging economies to export their products to the European single market at very low tariffs. The declared objective is to “offer developing countries long-term stability, particularly at times of growing global challenges and uncertainty, by promoting the integration of these nations into the global economy, contributing to the eradication of poverty and the creation of jobs whilst respecting human and environmental rights.”
The reform
The new legislation introduces stricter criteria for beneficiaries: to retain tariff advantages, countries will have to ratify new international agreements, including the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The two most hotly debated changes concern, on the one hand, the link between trade and migration and, on the other, safeguards for the European agricultural sector. Stricter criteria have been introduced (a longer assessment procedure and a mandatory commitment of at least 12 months with the countries concerned), which must be met to benefit from these trade advantages and, above all, the possibility of suspending tariff preferences in the event of a failure to cooperate in the return of irregular migrants. On this point, there was a strong reaction from Cristina Guarda (elected from the ranks of the Green and Left Alliance, within the European Greens group), who voted against the final regulation, describing the political blackmail over migrants as “unacceptable.” “This is not cooperation, it is neo-colonialism”, she declared, accusing Europe “of having lost its ethical compass” by making development aid conditional on the management of migration flows. On the opposite side, the Italian delegation of the European Conservatives, speaking through Carlo Fidanza, expressed great satisfaction with the link between tariffs and repatriation, describing it as a “historic battle of the Italian political right that has come to fruition.”
The second change concerns the automatic triggering of safeguard measures should rice imports increase by 45 per cent, to protect European producers from Asian competition. In practice, if imports from a beneficiary country rise significantly above the average of over the past 10 years, the EU will suspend preferential rates for the remainder of the year and introduce a tariff quota for the following year to prevent market disruption.
In this regard, the Conservatives stated that they were “dissatisfied with the outcome of yet another hard-fought battle concerning an important sector of Italian agriculture, a sector that has been under intense market pressure for several years now due to imports from Southeast Asia.”
His colleague and fellow Italian, Daniele Polato, talks about the figures: “Today’s vote essentially authorises 500,000 tonnes of rice from third countries to enter Europe duty-free, whereas back in 2014 the figure was 10–20,000 tonnes. This is what we will unfortunately end up with: low-quality rice at a low price, full of pesticides, produced by exploiting those workers, including minors, whose images we see in the news on a daily basis.”
Members of the Fratelli d’Italia party had proposed lowering the import threshold for triggering safeguard clauses to 20 per cent, but the amendments were not passed.
Polato provocatively raised questions about food sovereignty, wondering what had become of it in a context marked by a widespread sovereignty crisis. “We are facing a widespread sovereignty crisis, and Europe should take concrete action. Our concern is that third countries will then become Europe, and that these countries, which should be third parties, will far exceed Europe’s negotiating power, including from an economic perspective,” he concludes.
The Five Star Movement also spoke of “unprotected Italian excellence,” criticising the “Ursula majority” for rejecting the amendment to lower the threshold. According to the Five Star delegation, the regulation does not sufficiently protect Italian producers from “unfair competition” from Asia, highlighting how in 2025 the price of Italian rice plummeted compared to the previous year: “At the EU level, imports of Asian rice account for 80 per cent, and in 2025 the price of Italian rice fell to 60 cents per kg, roughly half that of 2024. Italy is Europe’s leading rice producer; we boast a heritage of farms that must be protected, not destroyed.”
The European Commission welcomed yesterday’s vote: it was the final step (apart from formal approval by the Council) before it comes into force on 1 January 2027.
English version by the Translation Service of Withub
