The European Commission proposed on Wednesday that all Ukrainian imports to the European Union remain duty-free until at least June 2025, although some agricultural products will be restricted in an attempt to quell growing unrest among farmers.
Imports of Ukrainian sugar, poultry meat and eggs, which increased sharply last year, will be limited to the level of 2022 and 2023.
The duty-free measures were first introduced after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 to help the country's economy, which is heavily dependent on agricultural and steel exports. They canceled the remaining tariffs not provided for by the EU-Ukraine free trade agreement of 2014.
The EU has also announced that it will apply similar duty-free measures to its trade agreement with Moldova.
"This proposal strikes the right balance: we continue our economic support for both countries, fully taking into account the interests and sensitivities of EU farmers," Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said in a statement.
At first, the Commission seemed unlikely to impose restrictions on Ukrainian products, but it succumbed to pressure from its own Commission member, Agriculture Commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski, as well as the governments of Poland and France, which were under the influence of protesting farmers.
The farmers' protests, which have spread to several EU countries, directly contributed to the Commission's shift in position, according to EU officials close to the discussions, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak for the record.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen — a staunch ally of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky — does not want to alienate European farmers, a key constituency for her center-right European People's Party, ahead of EU elections in June, officials said.
Commissioner Wojciechowski was the only member of her team who did not support the extension of free trade measures after insisting on limiting imports to pre-war levels.
Now the Commission's proposal must be approved by the EU countries and the European Parliament.
The Commission also announced that EU farmers will be exempted from organic farming measures that require them to set aside part of their land to promote biodiversity.
The move comes after pressure from France and comes ahead of President Emmanuel Macron's visit to Brussels on Thursday, where he will meet top EU officials on the sidelines of a special European Council meeting to oppose a trade deal with the Latin American Mercosur group.
Under the relaxed green rules in agriculture, farmers will be able to continue receiving subsidies from the Common Agricultural Policy budget by growing cash crops and nitrogen-fixing crops on set-aside land, provided they do not use pesticides there.
Farmers were granted an exemption from the requirements in 2023, but the Commission previously said it was legally impossible to introduce such a measure for that year.
Backlash against the green rules, which require at least 4 percent of land to be set aside for conservation, has been a common theme in protests across the EU, prompting the Commission to become more open to a workaround.
Brussels' decision to allow crops to be grown on virgin land in 2023 has been widely criticized, including by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization and environmental groups, which have noted that the land grows little food for human consumption.
Instead, it was used to grow animal feed, such as corn and soybeans, as well as sunflowers.
