Australia has put an affordable provide on the desk and received’t signal a free-trade settlement with the EU for the sake of it, Agriculture Minister Murray Watt says.
With agriculture rising as a sticking level regardless of a number of rounds of negotiations, Senator Watt reiterated the federal government wouldn’t signal the FTA until it assured good returns for Australian farmers.
“There’s a reason the former government didn’t finish a free-trade agreement with the EU – it’s because it’s probably the hardest one to reach,” Senator Watt informed reporters in Queensland on Monday.
He described the EU’s market as “heavily protected” and one which subsidised its farming trade that he mentioned made it tough to steadiness with Australia’s “highly efficient, non-subsidised” agricultural sector.
“But as I said last week, and (Trade Minister) Don Farrell has said, we’re not going to do a deal just for the sake of it,” Senator Watt mentioned.
“We want to see good market access for our producers so that they can get more value and more exports and more wealth for our country.”
Senator Watt mentioned some European nations had been combating depressed produce costs due to the continued struggle in Ukraine and this was additionally making the EU extra reluctant to signal a cope with Australia.
“But we’re hopeful that we can find a way through this,” he mentioned.
It’s not the primary time the Albanese authorities has prompt it should stroll away from the FTA whether it is unable to resolve key disagreements with the EU such because the one over agriculture.
The two events have additionally locked horns over the EU’s push for so-called geographical indicators that will stop Australian producers from utilizing names corresponding to prosecco or feta to label merchandise.
Senator Farrell left a sequence of conferences in Brussels empty-handed final week after the EU refused to fulfill Australia’s request for higher market entry for the nation’s farm exports.
Australia and the EU will return to the negotiating desk in a bid to resolve the stalemate, with Senator Farrell having secured one other spherical of commerce talks with European counterparts.
The delays imply an earlier aspiration to have the settlement signed by July seems all however lifeless within the water regardless of Australian and European officers reportedly signing off on a number of chapters of the FTA earlier this yr.
Source: www.perthnow.com.au
