The European Commission "is not listening to farmers" when it comes to negotiating trade deals, according to one policy executive representing farmers.

Noel Banville of the Irish Farmers' Association (IFA), who is based in Brussels, said that "outside of people based in Brussels and domestic civil servants, the people who know most about the EU, are farmers across Europe".

With potential trade deals in the future with countries such as Australia, Banville said that there must be some guarantees from the European Commission about whether it "actually wants to support farmers".

The IFA policy executive was speaking to Agriland at the European Parliament in recent days (see video below).

Banville said that some of the potential trade deals in the works could damage the agricultural sector across the EU which is in contrast to what the commission has stated in policies such as A Vision for Agriculture and its strategic dialogue.

"If the [European] commission was truly listening to farmers, they would be reviewing these trade deals with more clauses around the agricultural dynamics," he said.

"We look at trade deals that were made with Chile or New Zealand, there were sustainable food systems chapters within those, there wasn't a sustainable food systems chapter in the Mercosur deal," he added.

The deal with the Mercosur countries of South America would allow 99,000t carcass weight of beef - mainly from Brazil - to enter the EU at a much reduced tariff rate of 7.5%.

The farm organisation in Brussels, which is a member of the Copa Cogeca lobby group, has said that the EU needs to step up for farming at the negotiating table and needs to be much stronger.