As Donald Trump embarks on a full-blown trade war, France would like to substitute the United States with other trading partners. Does that imply Paris is prepared to welcome a huge trade agreement between the European Union and South America, which it has berated for decades?
French Trade Minister Laurent Saint-Martin stated that he is hoping the 20 percent tariffs that Washington imposed on all EU products on Wednesday would encourage the European Union to pursue trade agreements with other nations. “This is a wake-up call on trade agreements,” the minister stated.
“Diversifying our markets of trade has to be a priority if we are to make Europe not just a power ready to confront the United States, but a power receptive to other parts of the world. Mercosur is one of them, but the deal just has to be palatable. As it is, it still isn’t.”
Saint-Martin expressed hope that the European Commission would soon introduce adjustments France has long sought in the agreement reached between the EU and Mercosur — a South American bloc that unites Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.
The Mercosur agreement is a good one if, and only if, we are able to negotiate mirror clauses,”
Saint-Martin said, invoking France’s historic insistence that imported farm products conform to the same production standards applied to EU farmers.
France has been the EU’s most vociferous critic of the EU-Mercosur agreement, which was concluded last year but still requires the approval of EU nations before it comes into effect. Saint-Martin stated that it was not too late for the Commission to modify the deal to make it more palatable.
“We have a few months in front of us, until around the end of the summer, to do this work with the Commission, and I hope it will be fruitful,”
he stated.
That would involve reopening the talks on the agreement at a time when the two parties finalized their historic deal after over two decades of talks. The document is now undergoing translation and legal polishing before it faces a vote by EU nations.
Saint-Martin addressed a trip to Epernay, the headquarters of some of France’s best-known champagne houses, to reassure producers who were concerned about Trump’s vow to target European wine, champagne and spirits with huge 200 percent tariffs.
He toured the cellars beneath and the bottling equipment of Winston Churchill’s go-to champagne producer, Pol Roger. France seeks friends to press the Commission to revise the wording of the Mercosur agreement and on Thursday brought together ministers from Poland, Italy, Austria, Romania and Belgium to discuss it.
French Europe Minister Benjamin Haddad was reported to have suggested during the meeting that the Commission be requested to renegotiate the deal and include an automatic safeguard clause on “the most sensitive agricultural products,” as per a French diplomat who was given anonymity in order to adhere to French professional standards.
