There was no agreement reached on allowing grain exports from Ukraine into Poland following what appears to have been a tense meeting between officials from both countries last week.
Protests by farmers in Poland have been blocking and complicating grain exports from Ukraine, with Polish farmers saying that the imports of Ukrainian grain and other agricultural products is undermining the competitiveness of Polish produce.
In some cases, lorries carrying Ukrainian grain were stopped, and the grain spilled out on to the ground.
Tariffs and customs on many Ukrainian goods were waived in order ensure produce was able to leave the country following the invasion by Russia. These measures to reduce tariffs on Ukrainian goods are referred to as autonomous trade measures (ATMs).
Agriculture ministers from both countries met last week to try to negotiate an end to what is effectively a blockade of some Ukrainian exports by Polish farmers.
The Ukrainian Agri Council (UAC), a farmer organisation which was founded in 2014 and has been especially visible to EU observers since the war started, said that the talks on Wednesday “lasted five hours and were not easy”.
“The issue of transit of agricultural products, and thus the blockade, remains unresolved,” UAC chairperson Andriy Dykun said.
The UAC acknowledged the efforts of Ukrainian minister for agriculture Mykola Solskyi, and his Polish counterpart Czeslaw Siekerski, for “their willingness to cooperate in resolving export issues and unblocking the border”.
However, according to the UAC, not all participants were helpful in the negotiations, with the group claiming that Polish deputy agriculture minister Michal Kolodziejczak “caused serious concern among the participants [in] the meeting”.
The UAC said that Kolodziejczak’s attitude “may have a negative impact on further cooperation between the two countries”.
Ukraine ATMs
Outside of Poland, the Ukrainian ATMs are causing concern for a number of farming sector representative groups in the EU.
Earlier in March, the Council of the EU and the European Parliament agreed to extend the ATMs for Ukrainian produce, but in doing so decided to “beef up” protections for EU products that might be put at a competitive disadvantage, on foot of the concerns raised by farmers in general, and in Poland particularly.
Following that, groups representing food producers in different sectors across the EU said that the decision to set new limits on grain imports from Ukraine “fails to address farmers’ and manufacturers’ concerns”.
Six groups have repeatedly raised concerns on the ATMs and the impact they have on EU producers.
These groups are Copa-Cogeca (farmers and agricultural co-operatives); AVEC (poultry producers); CEFS (sugar producers); CEPM (maize producers); CIBE (beet growers); and EUWEP (poultry, eggs and game businesses).
One of the issues they have raised relates to the “emergency brake” included in the latest proposed ATM extension. This would allow tariffs to be reimposed if imports of certain products (but not wheat and barley) surpassed the average volume of imports from Ukraine over a reference period of 2022 and 2023.
These industry groups say this reference period is not long enough, and should have also included 2021.
Further negotiations in the Council of the EU (Council of Ministers) last week saw a proposal to amend the extension of the ATMs so that this reference period to trigger the emergency brake would include the second-half of 2021.
The six industry groups said in a joint statement that this was only a “half-step in the right direction”.
These groups are calling for the full year 2021 to be included, and for wheat and barley to be included in the list of products for which the emergency brake can be triggered.
The deal to extend the ATMs will have to be voted on by the European Parliament before it can be adopted.