The President of France, Emmanuel Macron, announced this Thursday (8) that his country will vote against the free trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur on Friday (9), in Brussels.
In a statement, Macron warned that the likely signing of the pact by the EU “is not the end of the story” and justified his opposition to what would be the largest free trade area in the world by “a unanimous political rejection” in France.
To prevent the ratification of this agreement, Paris would need a blocking minority in the EU which currently appears to be beyond its reach.
Amid protests from the French agricultural sector, which reached Paris this Thursday, Macron praised the European Commission’s “undoubted progress” in relation to France’s demands on certain aspects of the agreement.
However, the president cited as an example of the broad opposition to the pact “the recent debates held in the National Assembly and the Senate” of France.
The head of state assured that he will “continue fighting” for the European Commission to “put into practice” the measures he promised “to protect” French farmers.
Macron thus referred to the so-called “mirror clauses”, which, for example, would certify that meat from Brazil or Argentina would comply with EU health and environmental standards; and safeguards, a braking mechanism in case mass imports — in this case, from Mercosur — caused prices in France to fall.
To block the agreement, France would need at least four European Council countries representing more than 35% of the bloc’s population, something that, at the moment, seems difficult to achieve due to Italy’s expected change of position.
Another possibility is that MEPs do not ratify the agreement or speak out in favor of its analysis by the Court of Justice of the European Union.
