Tractors blocking roadways in Brussels, European legislators pelted with eggs, and the smell of manure in the air... these were the scenes across many cities in Europe in the past few weeks as farmers protested against policy changes they feel may take them out of business.
It is the agrarian variant, if I may, of the economic and trade headwinds European policymakers have had to negotiate over the past year or so. Their decisions will undoubtedly have a bearing on agricultural developments in Europe and beyond.
The protests are a chink in the armour of the common agricultural policy, a key feature of the postwar European unity project. Unsurprisingly, the fall of the Berlin Wall introduced particular features to the agro-industrial structure of Europe associated with the contradictions of integrating the former Warschau Pact countries and negotiating agreements with other trading blocs across the world on behalf of 27 member states.
The integration and ultimate agrarian restructuring of these republics introduced twin elements to the European agricultural story. In some instances it gave rise to what German scholar Martin Petrick calls the “southernisation” of many formerly communist agricultural communities, with low productivity growth and uneven integration into regional markets. Alongside this certain other parts of Eastern Europe experienced a deepening of their integration into transnational value chains.
This twin movement is on display now with a concern that is being raised by European farmers today — the removal of quotas on grain from Ukraine. While political unification of Europe is on the agenda, it seems many farmers at national level remain concerned about the effect that Ukrainian grain stockpiles will have on national and regional prices, in a context of rising transport, fertiliser, energy and “greening” costs.
The protests also reveal in stark terms the fantasy of autarky many European farmers operate under, precisely because of the way the three-generation-long subsidy programme has protected them from the vagaries of international competition, while economic diplomacy has allowed them preferential access to many developing country markets. This has created an even more perverse politic — agitation for greater protectionism at home alongside calls for the right to export (even at dumped prices) abroad.
“Ukrainian grain should go where it belongs,” a Polish farmers’ trade union stated, according to The Guardian, “to the Asian or African markets, not to Europe.” Southern Africa has been on the receiving end of this credo, with the Southern African Customs Union having to initiate trade defence investigations and sanctions against European exporters of poultry, pasta and frozen potato chips over the past decade.
An even more vociferous attack on a planned free trade area with South American trading bloc Mercosur has been associated with the European protests, with many — the loudest proponent being the French — suggesting that the agreement will allow South American products to land in Europe without meeting strict EU standards.
This, the farmers assert, amounts to unfair terms of competition as the cost structure and regulatory compliance expected of European agriculture is significantly higher than that of source countries of potential South American imports into the eurozone.
This is a historic political moment in the evolution of the European Commission and may frame and circumscribe the degree to which future trade negotiations between the zone and other blocs upset the apple cart on critical agricultural matters.
It is inadvertently one of the loudest pushbacks against the role of nontrade features (such as climate regulation and worker standards) in determining the competitive landscape and farmgate cost-return arithmetic for many farmers who have come to rely on strong state intervention in the market.
Whatever agreement is reached, the smell of manure is in the air; it may irreversibly change the patterns of globalisation in agriculture as we know them.
• Cawe is chief commissioner at the International Trade Administration Commission. He writes in his personal capacity.
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