Aachen/ Berlin/ Hamburg/ Vienna, 2.6.2022. Car companies have had a significant impact on the negotiations on the EU-Mercosur trade agreement, which has not yet been signed, and would benefit in particular. This is shown by the study published today:Mobility is slowing down. The EU-Mercosur Agreement and the automotive industry”. Lobbying did not just come from the companies themselves. Internal e-mails prove how employees of the German Ministry of Economic Affairs and the EU Commission actively approached business associations in order to ask their wishes and feed them into the negotiations with the Mercosur states. The study is published by Misereor, the German Environmental Aid, Greenpeace Germany, PowerShift, Attac Germany, Attac Austria and the network Just World Trade.
The result of the successful influence is a contract text that would eliminate tariffs on cars with internal combustion engines, auto parts and raw materials for car production, as well as promote the export of fuels based on food and feed. As a result, the agreement increases the consumption of fossil fuels in transport and promotes climate-damaging resource depletion. “This agreement slows down the urgently needed mobility transition at the expense of public transport”, criticises Hanni Gramann of Attac Deutschland. “We should focus on resource-efficient and climate-friendly alternatives that enable mobility for all, rather than meeting the profit expectations of the automotive industry.”
Demands for the conclusion of trade agreements such as EU-Mercosur have been growing louder since the war in Ukraine. By contrast, the study's publishing organisations see the risk of cemented dependence on fossil fuels and the expansion of soy and sugarcane cultivation for use as fuel at the expense of climate and world food through tariff relief for combustion engines and agrofuels. "Agricultural land is needed more than ever for food security, not for the production of meat or fuel for cars. With this agreement, the automotive industry wants to secure the export of its climate-damaging combustion engines for decades. At the same time, the agreement favours that even more food such as soy and sugar cane end up in the tank. This would further fuel the global food shortage based on a distributional crisis”, comments Tina Lutz from Deutsche Umwelthilfe.
The study describes in detail how the automotive industry benefits from close interaction with politics. These include the gradual elimination of all tariffs on cars and car parts and on important raw materials such as iron and steel, aluminum, copper, lead, zinc and lithium, which is important for electric cars. The Mercosur states also waive export taxes on soya, biodiesel and cowhide (car seats). "The EU-Mercosur agreement is a car-versus-meat deal with one main objective: manufacturers of climate-damaging cars to save production and import costs. This has nothing to do with a fair and sustainable trade agreement. It needs to be stopped", explains Lis Cunha of Greenpeace.
The agreement also poses enormous risks to the climate, the environment and human rights. It would facilitate and increase the export of soy, bio-ethanol from cane sugar, cowhide and metallic raw materials for the automotive industry. “As the study demonstrates with case studies, livestock farming, soy and sugar cane cultivation and mining of metallic raw materials in Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay are the main sources of deforestation, displacement of indigenous communities, environmental damage and human rights violations”, explains Armin Paasch of MISEREOR. "The sustainability chapter of the agreement, on the other hand, does not provide for any sanctions in the event of such damage."
"It is time for the EU to recognise the problems associated with non-transparent and undemocratic agreements such as EU Mercosur," says Jeremy Oestreich of PowerShift. "To effectively protect the climate, the environment and human rights, we finally need a trade policy that not only serves a few very powerful lobby groups." Ludwig Essig, Coordinator of the Just World Trade Network, adds: "It is precisely in these times that a fundamentally new trade and investment policy is absolutely necessary. This requires transparent and democratic negotiations, strong sustainability chapters and an end to the weakening of our environmental and social standards.”
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* Editors of the study "Mobility transition slowed down. “The EU-Mercosur Agreement and the automotive industry“ by Thomas Fritz: Misereor, German Environmental Aid, Greenpeace Germany, PowerShift e.V., Attac Germany, Attac Austria, Network Just World Trade.
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Background:
At the end of June 2019, the European Commission announced that it had reached an agreement in principle on a trade agreement with Mercosur. Since then, it has published some parts of the contract. This will be part of a broader association agreement with Mercosur. For the remaining parts of the Association Agreement, the negotiations were also concluded on 18 June 2020. However, its text has not yet been published. So far, the Association Agreement has neither been signed nor ratified – also due to resistance in some EU countries (including Austria). The EU Commission is trying to overcome this resistance through insufficient and non-binding additional protocols with the Mercosur countries.
