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Don't Let the EU-Mercosur Agreement Be a Loss for Animal Welfare
The EU talks a good game, but rhetoric alone is not enough. The ratification delay is a golden opportunity for reflection and to strengthen standards.
Mar 01, 2026
Gestation crates are metal cages, typically no bigger than 7 feet by 2 feet, used to contain female pigs—known as sows—for most of their breeding lives. The crates are so small that their inhabitants cannot walk or even turn around. Natural behaviors such as rummaging, fetching food, nesting, and grazing are all denied to them.
Without question they are among the cruelest fixtures in the meat industry. Many countries in the Western world, including the European Union, have either banned or significantly restricted their use. The European Commission plans to phase them out entirely by 2027. A recent landmark piece of legislation, however, threatens to undo this critical progress.
The EU-Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay) Agreement, signed to great fanfare on January 17, 2026, has been heralded as both historic and ambitious. Less discussed, however, is what the agreement could mean for animal welfare protections in both hemispheres.
The EU may be home to some of the highest animal welfare standards of any government in the world, but the same cannot be said for Mercosur, where millions of sows are still confined to gestation crates for long periods of time.
Unless safeguards are put in place, this trade agreement risks reversing the EU's progress on deforestation altogether.
Sinergia Animal, the international animal protection organisation whose Brazilian operations I lead, publishes a yearly report called Pigs in Focus, which ranks major Brazilian producers on their animal welfare standards. Despite being the country’s fourth-largest pork processor and a major dairy company, Frimesa has still not committed to ban crates for sows. Farrowing cages and battery cages for chickens remain widespread too. We have been negotiating with them for years, and despite their competitors making meaningful progress, they are still dragging their heels on making even basic improvements.
The problem does not stop with Frimesa. Minerva Foods, one of the leading meat producers in South America and a major supplier of pork products globally, continues to cause immense suffering. Ear notching, teeth clipping, and tail docking, as well as the routine misuse of antimicrobials, are all common. Again, while commitments to phase out these techniques have been made, our research exposes the use of excessively long deadlines that serve to prolong animal suffering.
These are not exceptional, isolated cases. They represent a wider system across Mercosur countries—one that may end up supplying significantly more of the meat consumed in the EU.
This raises serious questions about the EU’s commitment to animal welfare standards, which is why the European Parliament’s decision in late January to request a legal opinion from the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on the agreement’s conformity with the EU treaties, thereby halting the ratification process, is a welcome one.
The review could take up to two years, which gives EU policymakers more than enough time to revisit the issue of animal welfare and mitigate against the new incentive structures now in place for Mercosur producers.
It would, however, be a mistake to assume that greater attention should be paid to animal welfare protections alone. After all, lower standards mean higher yields. In Argentina and Uruguay, 89% and 88% of eggs come from hens kept in battery or enriched cages. In Brazil the figure is 95%. In the EU, by comparison, 38% of hens are still kept in cages—something seen as too high but will nonetheless put European producers at a significant competitive disadvantage.
An increase in demand for meat will also magnify pressure on vital ecosystems. As demand for land and animal feed goes up, so too will the rate of deforestation. The resultant loss of habitat will accelerate biodiversity decline, threatening ecosystems that are a key natural defense against climate change.
These developments cannot be divorced from the geopolitics of the climate crisis. With the US having reneged on its international climate commitments, the pressure is on the EU to at least partially fill the leadership void. So far they are failing, with initiatives such as the Deforestation Regulation and electric vehicle mandate either abandoned or reduced in ambition. Unless safeguards are put in place, this trade agreement risks reversing the EU's progress on deforestation altogether.
So what can the EU do? At a minimum, Brussels must demand that meat produced under unacceptably low standards is not imported to the EU. However, equally important is that Mercosur countries are still able to benefit economically from the agreement by retaining access to the EU market. This means pushing for Mercosur countries to eliminate battery cages and sow stalls, ban mutilations without pain relief, enrich spaces, and meaningfully improve handling standards.
The EU talks a good game, but rhetoric alone is not enough. The ratification delay is a golden opportunity for reflection and to strengthen standards. Political leaders have been right to label the agreement as historic, but unless robust protections are put in place, it may well be remembered for all the wrong reasons.
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'What Climate Breakdown Looks Like': 50,000+ Flee Wildfires as Chile Declares 'State of Catastrophe'
"The first priority, as you know, in these emergencies is always to fight and extinguish the fire. But we cannot forget, at any time, that there are human tragedies here," said the country's president.
Jan 19, 2026
On the heels of another historically hot year for Earth, disasters tied to the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency have yet again turned deadly, with wildfires in Chile's Ñuble and Biobío regions killing at least 18 people—a figure that Chilean President Gabriel Boric said he expects to rise.
The South American leader on Sunday declared a "state of catastrophe" in the two regions, where ongoing wildfires have also forced more than 50,000 people to evacuate. The Associated Press reported that during a Sunday press conference in Concepción, Boric estimated that "certainly more than a thousand" homes had already been impacted in just Biobío.
"The first priority, as you know, in these emergencies is always to fight and extinguish the fire. But we cannot forget, at any time, that there are human tragedies here, families who are suffering," the president said. "These are difficult times."
According to the BBC, "The bulk of the evacuations were carried out in the cities of Penco and Lirquen, just north of Concepción, which have a combined population of 60,000."
Some Penco residents told the AP that they were surprised by the fire overnight.
"Many people didn't evacuate. They stayed in their houses because they thought the fire would stop at the edge of the forest," 55-year-old John Guzmán told the outlet. "It was completely out of control. No one expected it."
Chile's National Forest Corporation (CONAF) said that as of late Monday morning, crews were fighting 26 fires across the regions.
As Reuters detailed:
Authorities say adverse conditions like strong winds and high temperatures helped wildfires spread and complicated firefighters' abilities to control the fires. Much of Chile was under extreme heat alerts, with temperatures expected to reach up to 38ºC (100ºF) from Santiago to Biobío on Sunday and Monday.
Both Chile and Argentina have experienced extreme temperatures and heatwaves since the beginning of the year, with devastating wildfires breaking out in Argentina's Patagonia earlier this month.
Scientists have warned and research continues to show that, as one Australian expert who led a relevant 2024 study put it to the Guardian, "the fingerprints of climate change are all over" the world's rise in extreme wildfires.
"We've long seen model projections of how fire weather is increasing with climate change," Calum Cunningham of Australia's University of Tasmania said when that study was released. "But now we're at the point where the wildfires themselves, the manifestation of climate change, are occurring in front of our eyes. This is the effect of what we're doing to the atmosphere, so action is urgent."
Sharing the Guardian's report on the current fires in Chile, British climate scientist Bill McGuire declared: "This is what climate breakdown looks like. But this is just the beginning..."
The most recent United Nations Climate Change Conference, where world leaders aim to coordinate a global response to the planetary crisis, was held in another South American nation that has faced devastating wildfires—and those intentionally set by various industries—in recent years: Brazil. COP30 concluded in November with a deal that doesn't even include the words "fossil fuels."
"This is an empty deal," Nikki Reisch of the Center for International Environmental Law said at the time. "COP30 provides a stark reminder that the answers to the climate crisis do not lie inside the climate talks—they lie with the people and movements leading the way toward a just, equitable, fossil-free future. The science is settled and the law is clear: We must keep fossil fuels in the ground and make polluters pay."
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Trump’s Animosity Is Bringing Europeans Closer Together and to the Rest of the World
There is an emerging consensus among European policymakers and experts alike that Trump wants to do to the E.U. what he is doing to the U.S.—destroy its civil society.
Jun 03, 2025
The European Union came into existence in 1992 with the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, which led to a single market, border-free travel, and the euro. Since then, the E.U. has evolved in various ways, although it has stopped short of developing a centralized fiscal authority and setting up a European army. Moreover, the E.U. has long been plagued by a number of legitimacy problems that have given rise to Euroscepticism among both left-wing and right-wing citizens.
Nonetheless, certain recent global developments are forcing the E.U. to upend many long-held ideas and norms about its own security and relations with other countries. Russia’s war in Ukraine and the sudden shift in U.S. policy toward Europe have made both policymakers and citizens across the continent more aware of the need not only for deeper integration and a new European governance architecture but also of the historical necessity to create a new world order. While Russia’s war in Ukraine has forced the E.U. to rethink its energy policy and compelled countries such as Finland and Sweden to become full members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), it is U.S. President Donald Trump’s hostility toward Europe and its institutions that is bringing Europeans closer together and even making them realize that the E.U. is a safe haven when all is said and done.
Indeed, the latest Eurobarometer survey, which was released on May 27, 2025, reveals the highest level of trust in the E.U. in nearly two decades and the highest support ever for the common currency. The overwhelming majority of respondents also displayed support for a common defense system among E.U. member states and opposition to tariffs. Equally impressive is the fact that a huge majority agreed that the E.U. is “a place of stability in a troubled world.”
Trump is trying to remake the United States in his own image and also to destroy the E.U., which he says is “nastier than China.”
These findings come just days after Trump told a rally in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania that he will double tariffs on steel and aluminum imports to 50%. This move, which will take effect on June 4, prompted the European Commission to announce that Europe is prepared to roll out countermeasures in order to retaliate against President Trump’s plan to increase steel and aluminum tariffs. It said that it “strongly” regrets Trump’s threat and that “if no mutually acceptable solution is reached both existing and additional E.U. measures will automatically take effect on July 14—or earlier, if circumstances require.”
The concern among many Europeans is that U.S.-E.U. relations are not only seriously damaged but that the U.S. has now become Europe’s enemy. Since coming to office, Trump has launched an active campaign against European democracy, with members of his administration not only bashing Europe but openly supporting far-right parties across the continent.
The common perception about Europe is that it is indecisive, too slow to act, even when major crises come knocking at its door. There is an element of truth in that, as the E.U. has shown a proclivity for reactive rather than proactive political behavior. But the Trump shock appears to be rousing Europe from its geopolitical slumber. The E.U. is standing up to the bully in Washington and is looking after Europe’s own interests with greater zeal than ever before. This is because there is indeed an emerging consensus among European policymakers and experts alike that Trump wants to do to Europe what he is doing to the U.S.--i.e., destroy its civil society. MAGA hates Europe for cultural and political reasons. For Trump, as Célia Belin, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and head of the Paris office, aptly put it, “Europeans are an extension of his political opposition at home... and Europe is thus a symbol of the political ideals [that] Trump seeks to eliminate, transform, and subjugate.”
In its attempts to find a new role in world affairs in the Trump era, Europe is not merely reacting to Washington’s whims but seeks to implement policies that reinforce its own strategic autonomy, both internally and externally. The European Commission has updated its industrial strategy by speeding up clean energy and pursuing new trade agreements with reliable partners. While some European leaders see both Russia and China as representing a threat to the rules-based international order, there have been numerous calls by various policymakers across the continent for a closer collaboration between China and the E.U. in light of “Trump’s ‘mafia-like’ tactics.” European Union leaders will travel for a high-stakes summit to Beijing in July after failing to convince Chinese President Xi Jinping to visit Brussels for a summit marking the 50th anniversary of E.U.-China diplomatic relations. And France has called for a stronger E.U.-China alignment on climate action amid the U.S.’ withdrawal from the Paris agreement.
China is the E.U.’s second-largest trading partner. Europe is, in fact, not only growing more dependent on China for manufactured goods but, in spite of differences in bilateral relations, such as China’s position on the war in Ukraine, is actually warming up to the idea that the E.U.-China relationship is an essential vehicle for tackling global challenges and safeguarding international multilateralism.
Europe is also looking into other regions of the world as part of a concerted effort to promote ever more vigorously its own strategic autonomy. Since Trump took office, the E.U. concluded a free trade agreement with Mercosur, an economic bloc made up of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Bolivia, with scores of other countries (among them are Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, and Peru) as associate members. Mercosur, or the Southern Common Market, is the fifth-largest economy and encompasses more than 285 million people.
The E.U.-Mercosur agreement, which had been in the making for 25 years, still needs to be ratified, and Argentina’s far-right Milei government, which is in close political-ideological alignment with the Trump administration, could prove to be a stumbling block to its ratification. Argentinian President Javier Milei is, in fact, more interested in signing a free trade agreement with the United States, which would be in violation of Mercosur regulations.
After many years of negotiations, the E.U. is also close to finalizing a free trade agreement with India. The 11th round of negotiations between India and the E.U. concluded on May 16, and there is a firm commitment by both sides to strike a deal by the end of 2025. As European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, this agreement would be “the largest deal of its kind anywhere in the world.”
If ratified, the E.U.-Mercosur free trade agreement will create a market of around 800 million people. When finalized, the E.U.-India free trade agreement will create a market of close to 2 billion consumers.
Trump is trying to remake the United States in his own image and also to destroy the E.U., which he says is “nastier than China.” One would like to believe that it is probably unlikely that he will succeed in remaking the U.S. in his own nasty image, but it is positively certain that he will not succeed in destroying Europe and its institutions, even though there is a lot that needs to be done to create a fairer and more inclusive Europe. In the meantime, however, Trump’s “mafia-like tactics” are bringing Europeans closer together and the continent ever closer to other regions of the world.
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