Farmers take to the street over Mercosur agreement

Local farmers protested on Saturday against the EU’s Mercosur deal at a demonstration outside the European Union House in Nicosia.

During the protest, the farmers presented a resolution addressed to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and co-signed by several groups including agricultural, environmental and student organisations, as well as farming unions.

The resolution demands the immediate reconsideration of the EU’s decision and the implementation of further measures to protect European agriculture.

While the agreement includes some regulations to ensure the safeguarding of products with a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), there were no such regulations for halloumi, one of the country’s top three export products which has a PDO, farmers said.

They stressed that a self-sufficient EU could not rely on food imports from third countries and warned that Mercosur could have “serious consequences for the fundamental rights of citizens, especially the most vulnerable groups.”

Mercosur primarily favoures larger EU countries with a sizable industries, enabling the export of industrial goods and technology, causing harm to small and medium-sized agricultural and livestock farms and European consumers, they warned.

The farmers argued that claims that the trade agreement would be of benefit to local consumers was misleading, as intermediaries, supermarkets and trading monopolies would benefit most from the abolition of tariffs.

The same resolution will be handed to President Nikos Christodoulides in the coming days.

On Wednesday, Akel MEP Giorgos Georgiou warned that the Mercosur deal “hangs like a sword of Damocles over the heads of farmers”.

He said safeguards approved by the European Parliament (EP) were insufficient to protect both Cyprus’ agricultural sector and European producers more broadly.

“We have failed to secure protection for basic traditional products,” he said.

Farmers union president Michalis Lytras had previously condemned the agreement, saying it was “a tombstone for the agricultural sector.”