Lula says Mercosur ready to sign trade deal with EU

The Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva assured this Saturday (June 16, 2024) that Brazil is “ready” to sign the free trade agreement negotiated by the European Union and Mercosur, which is now the equivalent of Europe, after the elections, the European Parliament decides on its own. “The problem now is them,” he said, referring to the renewal of the European Commission and the upcoming French elections, called after the victory of the far right of Marine Le Pen in the European elections.

“I told (European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen) that after all the negotiations that Brazil had conducted to change the agreement (…) Brazil was ready for what the EU wanted to sign, the question now is what they are doing,” he said at a press conference in the framework of the G7 summit. Von der Leyen expressed her commitment to the trade agreement in “X” after the meeting with Lula: “In Mercosur, the European Commission remains committed to achieving a good and mutually beneficial outcome,” she wrote.

Brazil was one of the countries invited to the annual summit of the world’s seven most industrialized democracies – Germany, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom. The agreement between the European Union and Mercosur countries – Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay – has been resisted by some European countries, mainly France, which fears an influx of South American agricultural products.

Lula added that von der Leyen “has to be appointed in about three weeks to take up the presidency of the European Commission that she holds today, and (French President Emmanuel) Macron has called for elections in France, so we have to wait.” Nevertheless, the Brazilian from the town of Carovigno in the Puglia region, where the G7 summit was held, is optimistic about completing the treaty that began negotiations 25 years ago. In 2019, the two sides reached an agreement in principle, but since then demands and doubts have emerged on both sides of the Atlantic, and a final signing has so far been blocked.

“I come back with optimism that in Mercosur we are ready to sign this agreement and I believe it will be good for everyone,” he said. If adopted, the treaty would allow South America’s agricultural giants to export meat, sugar, rice, honey or soya beans to Europe and, in the case of the EU, cars, machinery and medicines, among other things.