NFF CEO Mike Guerin.
THE NATIONAL Farmers Federation has backed the federal Coalition’s campaign to renegotiate the Australia-EU Free Trade Agreement before its ratification by parliament.
NFF chief executive officer Mike Guerin told Sheep Central the federation supports the Coalition’s decision to block ratification of the Australia-EU Free Trade Agreement.
“Australian farmers were promised a commercially meaningful outcome, yet the final agreement delivers little material improvement on the deal the Government rightly rejected in October 2023.
“The NFF supports any effort to secure greater and more meaningful market access for Australian agricultural exports,” Mr Guerin said.
“With global trade conditions becoming increasingly uncertain, commercially meaningful access to a market of more than 400 million consumers would provide valuable opportunities for Australian farmers. Australian agriculture deserves a better outcome than the one currently on the table.”
The Australian red meat industry has been critical of the current proposed agreement with chair of the Australia–EU Red Meat Market Access Taskforce, Andrew McDonald, earlier this year describing it as the “worst ever free trade agreement for Australian red meat industry to date.”
He said the agreement delivers just 30,600 tonnes carcase weight (cwt) of beef access over the next 10 years, when a minimum of 50,000 tonnes (cwt) was required simply to be in line with what the EU has offered our competitors.
“On sheep meat and goat meat, the result is equally disappointing: 25,000 tonnes (cwt) over seven years, despite Australian industry requesting a minimum of 67,000 tonnes cwt.
“This stands in stark contrast to New Zealand’s access of 163,769 tonnes, which is an outrageous discrepancy,” Mr McDonald said.
The Australian Meat Industry Council was also asked if it supported the Coalition in renegotiating the free trade agreement and CEO Tim Ryan said: “AMIC will engage closely with members as further details or the agreement become available and will seek feedback on the potential impacts to the red meat processing sector.”
Sheep Producers Australia did not specifically state whether it backed the Coalition stance when asked, only that its stance on the free trade agreement had not changed. This included that SPA will “continue to voice opposition to this outcome, work with industry partners to explore options, and advocate strongly for sheep producers through the next stages.”
Australia’s sheep and goat meat producers and processors have been shafted by government, industry body representatives and animal welfare groups. Misguided advice combined with weak leadership has seen New Zealand’s EU quota become nearly seven times greater than Australia. There are reasons for the discrepancy which have not been addressed.