For as long as the European Union is controlled by bicentennials who don’t know 80% of the world, it will never even grow more than 1%/year again.
Today, the european union, the trade group of socially and geographically interconnected countries in europe, vetoed the import of beef, chicken and other products of animal origin from Brazil. This comes in as yet another stupid choice made by the geriatric politicians in power, lobbied by farmers of France and Poland to slowdown or kill the EU x Mercosur trade deal.
Because free trade is only good when you’re winning, right?
Europe and Mercosur have been negotiating a trade deal of hundreds of different types of goods at increasingly lower tariffs from both sides for almost 30 years now. The idea is to increase commerce between the two economic blocs, creating history’s biggest free trade agreement ever signed.
But europeans never learn.
Europeans think of the global south the same way they used to 200 years ago:
- They’re all colonies.
- Everyone is poor.
- Everyone is uneducated.
- They only produce agricultural products.
And so it is that most europeans don’t care. Why would you care about trade with your colony?
At the same time, europeans fail to figure out why every single big EU economy is failing.
- It must be the immigrants!
- China is to Blame!
- The U.S. betrayal is destroying the economy!
No. Your stupidity is.
Europeans act high and mighty, but stand on no foundation what so ever. The world changed, and they stayed in place.
Do you know why China is winning, even with the U.S.’ stupid tariffs? Because they do trade with everyone.
China doesn’t care if their food comes from a poorer country. They don’t care if parts of their electronics come from an “adversary”. They don’t act stupid and meddle with other countries affairs. They just trade.
And this is the CORE of why the west is in collapse: arrogance. All of those countries and their century old leaders see the wrong world: they see things as they were 100 years ago. The old order is dead, every country has something to offer, and if you don’t take that offer someone else will.
When was the last time an european heard about Brazil outside of soccer? We’ve done nanotech skin cancer treatment and achieved highly developed nation status recently.
When has an european last heard of Mexico? When do they talk about China other than their issues? What imagine comes to their minds when someone says global south? Do most even know what is the global south?
Push for, scream about, cry and try all you want, unless you know the world as a whole, you will be left behind. You’ll always fail to understand why things happen, you’ll always be late for opportunities, you’ll always be disliked by those you look down on, if at all(and those are doors that never open again).
So, europe, do you want to be competitive? Learn to learn. Get out of your “I’m special” bubble you share with the americans, and take the global south serious, or get left behind.
As someone from poland that passionately disagrees with the mercosur deal i have to completely disagree with the whole framing of the post
The main contention within europe about the deal is not because we view people in south america as subhuman and unworthy of trade (Xd tbh) but because the deal would destroy local industry
The main argument goes something like this: farmers in europe are subject to the strictest food regulation on earth, and completely free trade with countries in south america would completely undercut local farmers, since south american farmers have considerably less regulation. This would completely destroy local farming and make europe dependent on food imports
I think not engaging with the core argument and instead just assuming wacism is unbecoming of a gentleman
Your argument is exactly the sort of stupidity and lack of world knowledge I mention in my post.
Brazil is subject to basically the same levels of scrutiny as european countries when it comes to farming, but the MOMENT its more competitive than the EU, yall just can’t accept it.
Like I said, free market until you aren’t number 1 right?
Even though the deal would benefit europe 2x more economically overall than mercosur.