The current “emergency” free-trade regime for Kiev is due to expire in June, according to Brussels
The EU plans to scale down its imports of Ukrainian farm produce, the bloc’s commissioner for agriculture Christophe Hansen has told AFP. An “emergency” scheme that allowed Kiev to sell such goods to the bloc without any tariffs is slated to end in June, as its member states no longer want to extend it, he explained.
Brussels suspended tariffs and quotas for Ukrainian agricultural produce after the start of the Russian military operation against Kiev in February 2022. The stated goal was to enable grain and other farm products from Ukraine to be shipped to global markets. However, these imports ended up flooding Eastern European countries, sparking waves of farmer protests.
Now, the bloc is expected to review its emergency scheme, according to Hansen. “Import quotas won’t remain the same as in this temporary liberalization. So, indeed, there will be fewer imports,” he told the news agency in an interview on Friday.
The commissioner urged the bloc’s member states to find a substitute solution before the expiration date. “Discussions will have to be swift. The European Union is ready to negotiate, and it should happen in the coming weeks,” he said, without revealing whether Brussels has any specific plans regarding the issue.
It is still “clear” that the EU members do not want the free-trade regime for Kiev to be extended any further, Hansen admitted. “We’ve seen that this has caused problems, especially in certain member states.”
Several Eastern European nations, including Poland and Bulgaria, which faced the most massive farmer protests, have repeatedly threatened to take unilateral measures against Ukrainian agricultural imports at the national level if their concerns are not addressed. Sofia called for an outright ban on Ukrainian eggs in September 2024.
Last week Reuters reported that the bloc plans to cut Ukrainian sugar imports “sharply”; further supplies from Ukraine would be “well below” current levels, the news agency said, citing a meeting between Hansen and French farm unions’ leaders.
Kiev has warned that putting an end to the free-trade regime would have grave consequences. “The European Union is our key trade partner, and that’s why it would be really damaging for us if we [found] ourselves in the situation we had before the war,” Ukrainian finance minister Sergey Marchenko told the Financial Times on Monday.
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