European Coordination Via Campesina | 31 July 2025
European Commission again prioritises trade over wellbeing of EU population
ECVC expresses outrage at the disastrous EU-US trade deal, sealed by Donald Trump and Ursula von der Leyen last Sunday in Scotland. This agreement is disastrous on several levels: it supports and legitimises Trump’s use of tariffs as a weapon of colonialism and deregulation, as well as the huge purchases of fossil energy and military equipment in the US, which are incompatible with EU environmental legislation, and also threatens living conditions of consumers and farmers by opening the European market to US agri-food products with low quality standards.
Once again, the European Commission has decided to prioritise trade interests over the general interest of European populations. Tariffs are not the most important aspect of this agreement: with this deal, the EU is lowering its quality standards to allow US products to enter the EU. Food and agricultural products from the US are produced with sanitary and phytosanitary products that are banned in the EU (such as chlorinated chicken or meat with hormones), GMOs, and chemical residues, and do not require detailed labelling (ingredients, allergens, origin, local language), do not have strict limits regarding pesticide residues, metals, veterinary medicines or use of methyl bromide and are not subject to restrictions for post-harvest treatments with specific pesticides. There are no bans on BHA, BHT, potassium bromate, some artificial flavours that are not approved in the EU, and the products fail to respect EU standards for livestock, animal transport, and hormone-free meat. As protests against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) agreement have shown, European consumers do not want these products, but prefer to be supplied with healthy food from local farms. For ECVC, this agreement is an introduction of TTIP through the back door!
By signing this agreement with Donald Trump, the European Union is deciding to protect industry actors, in particular in the automotive sector, to the detriment of consumer health, employment and human rights. It is once again using farmers and food quality as a bargaining chip, in total violation of its own legislation.
The Commission is choosing to prioritise militarization, abandoning the EU’s ability to feed its own population. This is reflected both in the proposal for a new CAP presented by the European Commission in July, which reduces the CAP budget by 20% without proposing any market regulation measures, and in the Commission President’s stubbornness to sign multiple free trade agreements such as the EU-Mercosur agreement.
In its urgency to sign this and other free trade deals, alongside reductions to the CAP budgets, the European Commission continues to betray and ignore farmers at a time when they most need protection and support. In addition, the EC drives the EU towards an export-oriented economy for the benefit of (mainly American) agribusinesses such as Cargill, Bunge, JBS or Unilever. Instead, the EU must ensure food sovereignty by protecting the internal market, supporting peasant agriculture, producing healthy food for the internal market and strengthening its rural areas.