Germany

Germany: Poultry farmers are demanding renegotiation of the Mercusor agreement

A flood of cheap poultry meat, produced to much lower standards, is threatening to flood the EU market. Not only would that destroy jobs, it would also disadvantage consumers and undermine plans to further develop domestic livestock farming.

Posted on May 15 ,00:15

Friedrich-Otto Ripke, President of the Central Association of the German Poultry Industry (ZDG), explains: "Brazil, as a leading member of the Mercosur block, is the world's largest exporter of poultry meat because it produces under significantly lower animal husbandry, animal, climate, environmental protection and food hygiene standards. Serving our consumers cheap meat of questionable quality would destroy jobs in the domestic poultry industry and make a mockery of our farmers, who are willing to invest to fulfill the federal government's promises to transform livestock farming". 

According to the ZDG, even without the Mercosur agreement, imports of poultry from Brazil into the EU grew by around 25% to over 313,000 tons from 2021 to 2022. In the recent past there have been scandals in the Brazilian meat industry, ranging from non-compliance with animal welfare regulations and poor hygiene in slaughterhouses to the sale of meat that was unfit for human consumption. Even after the discovery of what was initially the biggest scandal in 2017, violations of EU requirements continued to be discovered during inspections. According to a sustainability study commissioned by the EU Commission, imports of poultry and pork from the Mercosur countries could increase by almost 80% once the agreement comes into force. 

"For the benefit of EU consumers and domestic agriculture, the agricultural chapter of the Mercosur agreement must be completely renegotiated or the entire agreement rejected", Ripke concludes. For him it is very surprising that the Federal Ministers of the Greens Robert Habeck and Cem Özdemir are now campaigning for the ratification of the Mercosur free trade agreement. Many of her party friends would have rejected exactly this step just a few years ago. "The agriculture ministers, the federal government and the parties represented in the Bundestag must not allow themselves to be distracted from the content of the contract by non-binding declarations or bodies!" demands Ripke. 

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