On April 25th local time, the European Union held a meeting of agricultural ministers in Brussels to discuss the issue of Ukrainian food imports. However, after nearly 12 hours of consultation, no resolution was reached on this issue at this meeting.
The EU Agriculture Commissioner stated at a press conference after the meeting that the European Commission did not make any progress on the issue of Ukrainian food imports during the meeting with representatives from Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, and Romania.
Recently, the issue of Ukrainian food imports has sparked internal disagreements within the European Union. The EU believes that Poland's food embargo measures against Ukraine violate relevant EU regulations, but Poland demands more concessions from the EU. On the same day, Hungarian Agriculture Minister Naji Ishtwan stated that Hungary hopes to maintain import restrictions on Ukrainian food until the end of this year, in order to benefit its own food production. Ishtwan also requested financial support from the European Union to offset the losses suffered by Hungarian farmers so far due to Ukrainian grain dumping. Finnish Agriculture Minister Kurvinin expressed Finland's concern that a unilateral decision to ban food imports from Ukraine may undermine EU unity and provide confidence to Russia. He said that on the one hand, the EU strongly supports Ukraine, and on the other hand, it prevents Ukrainian food imports, which is unreasonable. French Agriculture Minister Fisno also emphasized that the unity of the EU requires a joint decision, rather than unilaterally implementing the embargo. In the middle of this month, Poland became the first country in the European Union to implement restrictions on Ukrainian food. Afterwards, Hungary, Slovakia, and Bulgaria followed suit one after another.
