“`html
Brussels – The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food of the Government of Spain, Luis Planas, has defended the trade agreement with the Mercosur countries and its importance in the current geopolitical circumstances, especially after the result of the elections in the United States, while criticizing “some mythology” about the pact that, in his opinion, “does not fit reality”.
This was stated on his arrival at the meeting of EU Agriculture and Fisheries ministers taking place this Monday in Brussels, asked about France’s rejection of the agreement that the bloc has been negotiating with Mercosur for more than two decades and which Brussels seeks to close before the end of the year.
“Each member state defends what it deems appropriate, but I believe there is some mythology around Mercosur that I do not think fits either the reality of the agreement or the moment we are living in,” Planas stated.
The Spanish minister explained that in the case of Spain, “only” 400 million in agri-food products are sold to Mercosur, while 4,000 are imported, which, in his opinion, represents “a very unbalanced balance.”
In Planas’ opinion, the EU must ask itself whether, in this geopolitical context and after the North American elections, it is interested in shutting itself off or “expanding the network of agreements with third countries to maintain its economic and commercial influence.” “I think the answer is very clear, and Spain has been very clear from the beginning,” he emphasized.
On the other hand, he announced that Spain, France and Italy have agreed to demand at the Agriculture and Fisheries meeting this Monday a moratorium on fishing limits in the Mediterranean in 2025 to ensure the stability of both fish populations and the affected fleets.
For this purpose, moments of the meeting were held by the three countries in a trilateral meeting to establish a common position on the total admissible catches (TAC) and quotas for the Mediterranean in 2025, despite the fact that, for the moment, the Commission has only made public its proposal for regulation, without specific figures or measures for the western Mediterranean.
“We estimate that the implementation of the regulation in the western Mediterranean has produced, in five years of application, a very serious decrease in the number of working days of vessels and only partially has maximum sustainable yield been achieved,” explained Planas, who advocated “looking for new ways to achieve the objective without the disappearance of fishing ports.”
“We have to seek a balance between biological stocks and the economic and social impact of the proposed measures,” defended the Spanish minister, who wants to present this element to the future Fisheries Commissioner, Costas Kadis, so that he takes it into account in his December proposals, when the twenty-seven will have to agree on the TAC and quotas for the next year.
In this way, the ministers seek to preserve the stability of stocks, but in a way that ensures the “survival of fish and also of the fishermen,” the Spanish minister emphasized, inviting to examine the effects of the reduction of effort, the closures, and the measures of selectivity. (November 18)
“`