Charlie McConalogue
Ceist:572. Deputy Charlie McConalogue asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the actions taken since EU free trade agreements were finalised with Mexico and Japan. [32153/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraThursday, 12 July 2018
Ceisteanna (572)
Freagraí scríofa
As an open economy, Ireland is generally supportive of such free trade agreements between the EU and other trading blocs, and strives to ensure that they reflect our economic and trade interests. The recently agreed FTAs with Mexico and Japan have been very positive in this regard, in that they provide significant potential for future trade, including for the agri-food sector.
The agreement with Mexico on 21 April 2018 provides for very significant access to the Mexican market for EU agri-food products, particularly for dairy, pigmeat and poultry. Mexico has a population of 127 million, making it the eleventh-largest country in the world in population terms and the fifteenth-largest economy in the world, with projections that it will move into the top five by 2050.
The discussions are now focused on completing the technical details of the agreement and negotiators expect to have a final text in late 2018 before starting the legal revision of the text. The Commission has stated that fine tuning is still going on, and it is addressing issues that will benefit Member States and industry.
On 8 December 2017 the EU and Japan finalised the Economic Partnership Agreement. After legal scrubbing and translation into all EU official languages this agreement was submitted for the approval of EU Member States on 18 April 2018.
This step marked the beginning of the ratification process at the EU level, and was the first step towards the signature and conclusion of the agreement. The EU and Japan are expected to sign the agreement at this week's EU-Japan summit, and are aiming for its entry into force before the end of the current mandate of the European Commission in 2019.
This agreement also represents a major boost for the EU agri-food sector, with considerable additional market access provided for beef, pigmeat and dairy products, particularly cheese. Japan is already Ireland’s third most import trade destination in Asia, with €94m worth of agri-food produce exported there in 2017, which was a large increase on the €56m worth of product exported in 2016. The main driver behind this increase is pigmeat (€26m worth exported in 2017 compared to €14m worth in 2016). In fact, Japan is the sixth most important destination for Irish pig meat globally. Other notable areas are dairy produce (€30m worth exported in 2017 compared with €15m worth in 2016) and fish (€15m).
I led trade missions to both Mexico and Japan recently. This was a very opportune time to bring a delegation of Ireland’s food leaders to both countries, given the recently concluded agreements. It was important to raise the profile of Irish agri-food enterprises that already have access to these markets, and make progress in negotiating access for others.
The destinations were also consistent with the recent market profiling exercise that was completed by Bord Bia at my request. This exercise identified opportunities in new and more mature markets. It will provide valuable market intelligence both for industry operators and policy makers in our continuing efforts to develop market opportunities for Irish exporters.