A trade agreement including a 99,000t increase in South American beef imports into the EU is on course to be signed next month after a breakthrough in talks over the past week.

The Irish Farmers Journal understands that negotiators have agreed a phasing out of Mercosur tariffs on European cars, a major stumbling block ahead of the next formal round of negotiations from 4 June. The Brazilian, Argentinian, Uruguayan and Paraguayan beef quota agreed in exchange would be split evenly between fresh and frozen cuts only, removing previously discussed subdivisions between manufacturing and high-quality cuts. This would open the option for Mercosur countries to target the high-value EU steak market with their full quota if they wished to do so. The prospect of France getting imminent access to China for its beef may give Paris a political opportunity to lift its opposition to the deal.

“We are not yet concluded, but discussions continue very intensively. There are some difficult issues still to solve but we are working on it,” European Commissioner for Trade Cecilia Malmström said on Tuesday. Spanish Trade Minister María Luisa Poncela, who supports the deal, said that after a pause earlier this year “negotiations have been reactivated in the past week and are on the right track” but issues such as the protection of EU geographical indications remained under discussion.

In an interview with the Irish Farmers Journal at the end of a trade mission to China, European Commissioner for Agriculture Phil Hogan played down the impact of a potential Mercosur trade deal on agricultural markets. “We should be positive in relation to the future of our exports to Asia and to Mexico and let Mercosur take care of itself in due course when we have to make those difficult decisions,” he said, adding that any agreement would “take 10 years to implement”.

Listen to an interview with Commissioner Hogan in our podcast below:

IFA president Joe Healy has called on An Taoiseach Leo Varadkar to “make it clear to the European Commission that Ireland will block a bad Mercosur deal on beef”.