Brussels mulls compensation package to EU farmers over Ukraine imports
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The European Commission is reportedly studying a new package of assistance to mitigate the severe competition posed by duty-free Ukranian products.
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50 euro bill in a sprout of barley spikes, 2021 (Shutterstock)
The European Commission is reportedly studying a new package of assistance to mitigate the severe competition posed by duty-free Ukranian products, according to European Commission spokesman Balazs Ujvaris.
"When it comes to the first package, we are talking about 56 million euros [$61 million] … and work is ongoing on the package of similar magnitude," Ujvaris said.
The first farmer assistance package was employed back in March, whereby $61.2 million worth of financial compensation was allocated for Polish Bulgarian, and Romanian farmers. Additionally, comparable sums of financial compensation are expected to be dedicated by the national governments once EC approves it.
Back in June, the EU suspended the collection of tariffs on goods imported from Ukraine for one year in an effort to assist Ukraine to maintain a steady outflux of exports despite the plight of the raging war. The EU initiative allowed the export of millions of tonnes of Ukrainian grain without tariffs.
However, this move was not without consequences: given the aberrations, it shook the subtle balance of the European market.
Read more: EU might suspend Ukraine tariff exemption over competition complaints
Back in January, a delegation from some of Ukraine's neighboring countries, such as Poland, Hungary, and Romania, stressed that the negative impact of Ukrainian duty-free products must be fixed: citing the negative "impact on their farmers” competitiveness.
Other European countries have also been raising complaints recently regarding the tariff-free Ukrainian agri-food products flooding the EU market, as domestic producers and farmers are facing disadvantages and struggling to compete.
In 2016, an agreement between the EU and Ukraine, the deep and comprehensive free trade agreement (DCFTA), allowed almost half of Ukraine's agricultural products to enter the union free of tariffs, however, the rest of the products were liberalized only last year, knowing that the current one-year temporary trade liberalization scheme is up for review in June 2023.
Read more: Farmers protest in Brussels against govt environmental plans
Furthermore, the stipulated market aberrations by the EU aren't the only source of grievance between the farming class and the European Union and European national governments. Back in early March, an estimated 2,700 tractors blocked roads in the Belgian capital of Brussels as farmers from the Flanders region took to the streets to protest against moves to cut nitrogen emissions.
Flemish farmers are pushing against a pro-environmentalist effort by the government of their Dutch-speaking region aimed at cutting nitrogen emissions from fertilizers and livestock.
