The Stop EU-Mercosur Coalition aims to raise public awareness and unite citizens against the proposed EU-Mercosur agreement.
This trade agreement concluded by the European Union and the countries making up Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela) aims to establish a free trade area between these two zones, which would result, among other things, in the simplification of customs procedures and the removal of non-tariff barriers. This free trade agreement, which has still not been finalised, is highly contested. Its anticipated impact on the climate, ecosystems and human rights have led many civil society organisations, including Emmaus International, to oppose it. The origins of this agreement and its negotiations date back to the late 1990s, a period in which growing inequalities, the climate crisis and the collapse of biodiversity were virtually absent from public and political debate. There are many reasons why we are now calling for a complete halt to this agreement:
- This agreement would incentivise biodiversity and ecosystem collapse. It perpetuates the path of dependency of South American agricultural systems on exports and on global markets. It encourages monocultures at the expense of diversification and the preservation of large ecosystems. This is one of the main factors behind deforestation in the Amazon.
- It grants European multinationals access to public tenders in Mercosur countries, allowing them to bid for water and sanitation contracts, among others. Local jobs and companies will lose out and this will only reinforce the privatisation process already underway.
Read more about the agreement and why the Stop EU-Mercosur Coalition is uniting against it: here.
