Tariff hikes and the invasion of Venezuela accelerated the EU-Mercosur agreement.
Donald Trump's protectionism and instability in Venezuela accelerated the resumption of the treaty after more than two decades of negotiations between the two blocs.
247 - The approval of the trade agreement between Mercosur and the European Union has advanced decisively after 26 years of negotiations marked by political impasses, changes of government, and global crises. The return of Donald Trump, the current president of the United States, to the White House for a second term has altered the international landscape and led the European Union to accelerate its search for new strategic partners, in the face of the resurgence of American protectionism. This information comes from the newspaper... The Globe.
On Friday, the free trade agreement received the green light from the ambassadors of the 27 European Union countries, meeting in Brussels. Although the formal vote is still scheduled for later in the day, diplomats present at the meeting indicated sufficient consensus to consider the agreement politically approved. Official declarations of the votes are expected to be released at 17 pm Brasília time.
The positive assessment of the treaty's progress stems from the statements made by representatives of the member states during the meeting that began this morning in the Belgian capital.
The international context played a decisive role. Throughout 2025, Donald Trump adopted a series of protectionist measures that directly affected historical trading partners of the United States, including countries of the European Union. The so-called "tariff hike" provoked trade tensions and led the European bloc to intensify efforts to diversify markets and reduce its dependence on trade with Washington.
Furthermore, the agreement with Mercosur came to be seen by European leaders as a political gesture in defense of multilateralism, in contrast to the unilateral initiatives of the US government. The recent invasion of Venezuela and the kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro reinforced, according to diplomats, the perception of isolation in US foreign policy, increasing the need for coordination among other powers and regional blocs.
Negotiations between Mercosur and the European Union began in 1999 and went through different phases. After advances and setbacks, a partial conclusion was reached in 2019, but sensitive issues remained unresolved. The Covid-19 pandemic interrupted the dialogue again. The resumption gained momentum from 2023 onwards, with the beginning of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's third term, when issues such as government procurement, rules for international bidding, and environmental commitments returned to the table.
Even so, it was only after the election of Donald Trump in November 2024 that negotiations began to advance rapidly. Diplomats from both blocs worked on a new draft of the treaty, the conclusion of which was officially announced during the Mercosur summit held in Montevideo in December of that year.
The agreement also came to symbolize a political alignment around global agendas, such as combating climate change and strengthening multilateral institutions, in line with agendas advocated by the United Nations and the G20. This signal was interpreted as a direct counterpoint to the worldview defended by Trump.
A source in the Brazilian government told... Globe that “the agreement is a pro-multilateralism movement, in line with the empowerment of the G20 and the launch of the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty, among others”, referring to the initiative presented by Lula in 2024, when Brazil chaired the group of the 20 largest economies in the world.
Another source involved in the negotiations highlighted to the newspaper, still at the end of 2024, that Trump's election was crucial in unlocking the process, just as it had been in 2019, during the first term of the current US president, when the trade war with China began. At that time, the increase in import tariffs by the US generated chain reactions in global trade.
According to this assessment, the agreement was frozen in 2019 due to the negative repercussions of Jair Bolsonaro's government's environmental policy in Europe and the election of Alberto Fernández in Argentina, who opposed trade liberalization. Between 2023 and 2024, these obstacles were gradually removed.
