2023-11-20 20:41 update: 2023-11-21, 13:45
Robert Telus. Photo PAP/Marian Zubrzycki
Poland's agriculture minister has expressed concerns that Ukraine's proposed EU accession would be a challenge for the bloc's agricultural sector, urging the bloc to seek solutions to prevent Polish farmers from being harmed by it.
Speaking on the sidelines of an EU Agriculture and Fisheries Council sitting in Brussels on Monday, Robert Telus said he had taken part in meetings with the Visegrad Group countries (Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary) as well as with a coalition of five 'frontline' states affected by Ukrainian agricultural exports (Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia). He said the talks had centred on Ukraine's proposed EU accession.
"These are challenges for EU agriculture," Telus told journalists. "But primarily for ours - I mean Poland and the frontline countries. We have to discuss this subject now. We have to seek such solutions so that it will not harm European agriculture; that Ukraine's EU accession does not harm our farmers - Polish and those of other frontline countries. We agree - both groups - that these issues are important, that we have to take care of them."
EU ministers also discussed the transit of Ukrainian grain via the bloc. Telus said that in this regard, unilateral embargoes imposed by Poland, Hungary and Slovakia had shown that transit could be conducted.
"This transit is ever greater, ever better," he said. "This grain does not stay in our countries. This is a good solution."
Telus said many EU member states had privately agreed with his position and he expressed hope that the European Union would draw conclusions from the situation and create a system at the EU level to ensure Ukrainian goods would reach the same markets as before the war. (PAP)
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