Hungarian minister Nagy: Brussels keeps the agriculture crisis going

The European Parliament has made the situation of European farmers more difficult by voting to extend trade liberalisation measures for Ukraine by another year, István Nagy, the minister of agriculture, said in a statement on Wednesday.

Nagy noted that the EP on Tuesday voted to extend the suspension of import duties and quotas on Ukrainian agricultural products until June 5, 2025. The legislative body’s decision maximised the duty-free import volume of poultry, eggs and sugar at the average of import volumes recorded in the last three years, the minister said, adding that this quota would “essentially maintain the greatly increased import volumes of recent years”.

Brussels keep the agriculture crisis going?

He said it was “an even bigger problem” that there were no restrictions on grain and oilseed. If the import trends seen in the first three months of the year continue, the import of Ukrainian corn and grain into the EU will surpass the record volumes seen in 2022 and 2023, the minister said.

Nagy said this would have “unforeseeable” consequences for European farmers, arguing that they could not compete with the “hundreds of thousands of hectares of Ukrainian farmland in the hands of international big capital which must abide by much laxer rules”.

“By doing this, Brussels is keeping the agriculture crisis going and financing the war instead of supporting European farmers,” Nagy said.

Hungary is maintaining its ban on the import of Ukrainian agricultural produce, but Brussels must also act, he added.

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