LTO Brussel 🇪🇺

Thank you to our Flemish member @Boerenbond for the great #AgriEUconnect event this evening with the important message from 🇧🇪 PM @alexanderdecroo on reconnecting with our agriculture and fostering conversation and collaboration instead of polarisation. 👏🤝 #EUFarmersDeal

📄JOINT STATEMENT - Despite legitimate concerns and protests, 🇪🇺 decision makers negotiating in trilogue last night on the renewal of the Ukrainian ATMs have proceeded by ignoring the key concerns of our producers. In the negotiations, the key amendments of the @Europarl_EN vote in the Plenary have not been pushed forward, leading to a “weak compromise” on the most consensual elements. Our organisations understand the political sensitivity of this agreement, as well as the need to support 🇺🇦, but it is unfortunate that the small but important adjustments which would have delivered an effective solution for 🇪🇺 producers were not considered. 👉While the inclusion of oats, groats and honey and the shortening of the activation period can be welcomed, without the change of the reference period in question from 2022/23 to 2021/22/23, the burden on the 🇪🇺 farming sector will persist and so will their discontent. 👉The inclusion of maize is pure window-dressing, as given the lack of previous TRQs in the association agreement, even if the 2022/23 average would be reached, it would have no effect! Similarly, the arbitrary inclusion of oats and groats, which represent much smaller volumes than wheat, will not be effective. The situation is so critical in Brussels that the @EUCouncil , convening in COREPER this morning to discuss the outcome of the trilogue, has opted to delay the vote on the compromise reached, until next week. On its side, the European Parliament @EP_Trade, with a very untransparent process towards its own members (to say the least) decided to proceed with a vote and approve the agreement! In this context, our organisations cannot support the agreement reached in the trilogue and call on the Member States and the Council to seriously reflect on the signal they would be sending to European farmers and manufacturers, including a new compromise to be discussed in trilogue! Full Joint Statement >>> copa-cogeca.eu/press-release…