EU integration of the Ukrainian agri sector: how to strengthen negotiating positions?

Author: Olha Trofimtseva, Doctor of Agricultural Sciences, Ambassador-at-Large of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2022-2023).

Despite objective negative factors, such as the full-scale war, Ukraine has demonstrated further progress in adapting its national legislation to the regulatory framework of the European Union. Along with this, the expansion of bilateral trade opportunities in the agro-industrial sector, particularly thanks to the additional autonomous preferences granted by the European Commission in 2022 to support Ukrainian agricultural and food producers amid Russian aggression, has enabled domestic agricultural producers and exporters to promote their products more actively and effectively in the EU internal market, thus strengthening the practical component of European integration. However, of course, this process is not without its challenges.

According to the results of the self-screening conducted to analyse the progress of the implementation of the EU acquis in 2023, a list of systemic challenges that impede the rapid and more effective adaptation of Ukrainian legislation to European norms was identified. Having reviewed other reports and working papers in this area, it can be stated that the main problems and challenges include:

• insufficient institutional capacity of the government authorities, which need more experts to develop the necessary legislation;
• lack of sustainability and coherence of agricultural policy and other interrelated regulatory areas;
• shortage of internal financial resources (including due to limited budgetary resources caused by the martial law) and unpredictability of planning the financing of measures related to the implementation of the CAP in Ukraine;
• the need to create new specialised institutions or bodies in some of the areas, for example, to allocate, control, monitor and report on the funding of support programmes and measures.
• the need for high-quality professional translation of EU legal acts into Ukrainian and terminological harmonisation of existing documents;
• the need for an in-depth study of EU regulations and their analysis;
• the need for systematic and sustainable professional development or general training in European integration at all levels and sectors.

Recommendations:

1. Given the multilevel and multifactorial scope of work in the area of approximation of the national agricultural policy to the EU standards and practices, some of which have been discussed in this study, it is considered appropriate to create a multilevel matrix of harmonisation of Ukraine’s agricultural policy with the EU CAP, taking into account the reforms in the EU itself and all levels of this process: strategic, institutional, infrastructural and sectoral (by separate sectors of the agro-industrial complex).
2. As noted above, one of the main challenges of the European integration process in the agricultural sector is the lack of domestic financial resources. On the one hand, this requires a clear and practical prioritisation of the tasks on the agenda and, on the other hand, more active allocation of additional funds through enhanced cooperation with European partners within joint projects and cooperation programmes.
3. As this material repeatedly emphasises, all levels of development and implementation of agricultural policy decisions in the European Union require the involvement and consultation of all stakeholders in the sector to take their positions into account as much as possible and ensure an inclusive approach to policymaking. This principle of inclusiveness should become a condition for all European integration processes in Ukraine.
4. The experience of EU enlargement in previous years shows that the agricultural sector is usually the most challenging and sensitive topic in negotiating and coordinating positions of existing EU member states and candidate countries. To mitigate the difficult negotiation process and find common ground in the agricultural sector, it is necessary to offer our partners in the EU countries to consider the Ukrainian agrarian sector as a strengthener of the EU’s position on world markets, as a valuable component for achieving the stated strategic goals of food security, strategic leadership and autonomy in key sectors of the economy, as well as an element of the bioeconomy and green economy of the community within the framework of the existing dialogue.
5. Sustaining well-coordinated and systematic dialogue with EU colleagues and partners at all levels implies working together not only on communication and joint events on this topic but, above all, on collaborative and meaningful work of scientists, researchers, and representatives of local governments to develop solutions in various areas of agricultural policy and rural development.