Today, during the European Parliament’s plenary session, Law and Justice MEPs voted against Gabriel Mato’s report on the bilateral safeguard clause provided for in the EU––MERCOSUR Partnership Agreement and in the EU–MERCOSUR Interim Trade Agreement with regard to agricultural products, arguing that the proposed mechanism does not provide real, effective, and immediate protection for European—and in particular Polish—farmers against the negative effects of this agreement.
The PiS delegation opposed the adoption of the report, taking the position that the proposed safeguard mechanism does not provide real and effective protection for European, and in particular Polish farmers, and that in its current form it does not address the fundamental threats arising from trade liberalization with Mercosur countries.
PiS MEPs argue that, above all, the mechanism does not provide for a firm, legally binding, and effectively monitored alignment of production, environmental, and sanitary standards between the European Union and the Mercosur countries. They also point to the lack of a mechanism to automatically trigger a safeguard clause in the event of damage to the agricultural market. It was precisely these provisions that were the subject of key amendments proposed by PiS MEPs—amendments that could have effectively protected Polish agriculture but were not adopted.
Furthermore, as PiS MEPs emphasize, instead of effective protective tools, a mechanism burdened by excessive bureaucracy was adopted, in which the decision to trigger it was left to the European Commission. The EU institutions’ sole obligation will be to conduct an investigation, not to take immediate action in a crisis situation. In practice, this means delays and a lack of real protection for agricultural producers when a threat arises.
In the opinion of the PiS delegation, the safeguard mechanism is flawed in its very conception. It is purely reactive in nature—a belated and far too weak response to the damage that the EU–MERCOSUR agreement inflicts on Polish agriculture. Moreover, its adoption in a plenary vote legitimizes the agreement itself and demonstrates that, rather than addressing the root cause, the European Union is ineptly attempting to mitigate its negative effects.
The Law and Justice delegation consistently maintains that protecting Polish agriculture requires firm and effective solutions. The EU–MERCOSUR agreement remains a serious threat to food security and the competitiveness of European and Polish farmers.
