MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Mercosur-EU FTA signed at last

“Mercosur will bring significant benefits to consumers and businesses on both sides,” Von der Leyen said

The South American Common Market (Mercosur) and the European Union announced Friday in Montevideo the final signing of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between both blocs, thus creating the largest and most populated commerce zone worldwide. The understanding was reached after 25 years of negotiations and despite France's reluctance.

“It is a historic milestone,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in the Uruguayan capital alongside Presidents Luis Lacalle Pou (Uruguay), Javier Milei (Argentina), Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Brazil), and Santiago Peña (Uruguay), the four founding members of the regional alliance which now includes Bolivia as well.

“We stand together on a world stage as partners... it means more jobs and good jobs, more choices and better prices,” Von der Leyden told a press conference. “Mercosur will bring significant benefits to consumers and businesses on both sides, it will facilitate European investment... this will bring great business opportunities,” she added.

A draft treaty was announced in 2019 but it needed ratification from each EU member's Parliament where it faced objections dealing mainly with environmental, economic, and political issues. It went through careful rewording since then to reach Friday's climax.

The signing took place on the sidelines of the 65th Mercosur leaders' summit during which Lacalle Pou is to pass on the bloc's rotating presidency to Milei, who said in his speech Friday that “it is commerce what brings prosperity” while insisting on the need to set aside those [leftist] ideas that hindered an FTA from being concluded with the United States.

(See also: Mercosur-EU FTA ratification imminent)