Get ready for a storm of metaphorical, and maybe literal, slurry to be launched in the direction of the European Commission.
Ursula von der Leyen’s decision to allow the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement to come into effect before it has been ratified by MEPs, will be a big problem farmers and other opponents of the deal, who had mounted a vocal campaign to block it.
The deal will slash tariffs that had acted as a barrier to trade between the EU and Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.
The accord will open up the huge South American market to European industry and businesses. German carmakers, Spanish olive oil producers, Irish whiskey distillers and dairy farmers, and plenty more sectors stand to benefit.
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The farming lobby has publicly raged against the trade deal though, over fears beef farmers will be undercut by competition from cheaper South American products, produced to what they say are lower standards.
The commission, the EU’s executive branch that leads on trade, points to solid protections it negotiated. It can reimpose high tariffs on beef imports, if there is evidence of South American products flooding the European market and distorting prices.
Brazilian beef is already sold into the EU today, but in relatively modest quantities because of the current tariff barriers.
The Mercosur bloc will only be permitted to sell 99,000 tonnes of beef per year into the EU at lower tariff rates. That’s the equivalent of two extra steaks or burgers a year, for each European citizen.
Von der Leyen’s decision to see the deal enter into force on an interim basis is controversial. The European Parliament has not yet ratified the agreement. That vote would have taken place this spring and was expected to be close.
A majority of MEPs - mostly opponents of the deal - last month voted to refer it to the European Court of Justice for a legal review, which will take a year or two. That put a pause on the ratification process.
Rather than delay or spike the deal, that instead opened the door for the commission to apply it on a provisional basis in the meantime.
Von der Leyen would likely never have tried that had the parliament been due to vote to ratify or reject it in the next month or two.
Some MEPs were facing huge pressure to vote against the deal, but privately worried about the EU spurning a big trade agreement in a time of such global uncertainty.
Kicking it to the courts, in the knowledge the commission would probably bring the EU-Mercosur agreement into force in the interim, got them out of an awkward spot.
When a majority - 21 out of 27 EU member states - backed the deal in January, they gave the commission the power to provisionally apply it.
The Brussels-based executive body in 2017 brought the EU-Canada trade deal, known as Ceta, into force on a provisional basis.
However, that was after it had been greenlit by MEPs in the European Parliament. It was the 27 national parliaments that posed the difficulty then. A few, including Ireland, are finally only giving their formal consent to Ceta this year, though it has been in operation for years.
Fears about Canadian beef devastating the Irish agricultural industry proved to be totally overblown. In fact, Irish farmers have benefited, statistics show.
The same story may play out when it comes to the Mercosur deal, in which case MEPs who oppose it will have a much tougher time rallying a majority to reject the agreement, when they do finally get their vote in 18 months’ time or so.
