Overview
- Foreign ministers are slated to sign the pact at a Saturday ceremony in Asunción, with Argentina’s Javier Milei and Uruguay’s Yamandú Orsi attending and Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva not traveling.
- Argentina’s foreign minister Pablo Quirno says the EU will remove tariffs on 92% of Argentine exports and grant preferential access to another 7.5%, with 99% of Mercosur agricultural exports benefiting.
- The agreement phases out most tariffs over about a decade and protects hundreds of European geographic indications, while opening EU markets to Mercosur agriculture and Mercosur markets to European industrial goods.
- A new beef quota grants Mercosur 99,000 tonnes annually at a 7.5% in‑quota tariff rolled out over five years, supplementing existing contingents such as the Hilton quota.
- European resistance is intensifying as major French supermarket groups, including Les Mousquetaires, Carrefour, Leclerc and System U, pledge not to source Mercosur meat, and the deal still requires approval by Mercosur and multiple parliaments before taking effect.