At the start of 2026, a new surprise emerges in Spain’s already busy political and economic landscape, with an unexpectedly strong display of support that threatens to fracture the relationship between the People’s Party and one of its most loyal electoral bases: the agricultural sector. At the center of this future and possible conflict lies the trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur, a historic accord aimed at integrating the markets of Europe with those of Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay.
While the opposition leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, deffinishs ratifying the pact as an unavoidable geostrategic opportunity, Spanish farmers and ranchers describe it as a death sentence for the model of exploitation. This confrontation is not only a dispute over tariffs, but a deep clash of visions about the future of food sovereignty, sustainability, and Spain’s ability to compete in a globalized world under rules that the agricultural sector deems deeply unfair and that could jeopardize health controls among others.
PP’s Support for Mercosur
From Feijóo’s perspective, the agreement with Mercosur “represents an indispensable tool for the European Union to regain its relevance as a global actor in a complex, dangerous and uncertain international context.” The president of the People’s Party maintains that the spaces of influence Europe leaves vacant will inevitably be occupied by geopolitical rivals, which would weaken the continent’s position against emerging powers.
For Feijóo, the treaty means opening new markets for Spanish companies, especially in sectors such as automotive and machinery, and strengthening political alliances with nations that share historical and cultural ties with Spain. However, his support is not a blank check; the PP leader insists that the technical work before enattempt into force is not finished and he demands that automatic protection clautilizes and a rigorous border control be ensured to guarantee equal terms.
SPANISH AGRICULTURE AGAINST IT
This vision of lofty diplomacy clashes head-on with the reality described by agricultural organizations such as ASAJA, COAG and UPA on the counattempt’s roads and ports. For the primary sector, “the discourse of economic opportunity is a fallacy that ignores a devastating technical asymmeattempt.” The sector’s main demand is summarized in the so-called mirror clautilizes or principles of reciprocity. Spanish producers claim that, while they are subject to the strict regulations of the Green Deal and the Farm to Fork strategy, their South American competitors operate under much looser standards. This regulatory difference allows Mercosur countries to produce food at substantially lower prices, which in practice amounts to unfair competition protected by the very community institutions.
The technical chasm is especially visible in the phytosanitary and chemical sphere. In Spain, the utilize of about four hundred fifty active substances for pesticides and herbicides is prohibited due to their environmental impact or health risks, following the European Union’s precautionary principle. By contrast, in Brazil or Argentina substances such as glyphosate with fewer restrictions, paraquat or atrazine are routinely utilized.
These chemicals enable pest control to be much cheaper and more efficient in the short term, but they are banned on European soil. The agricultural sector criticizes that the European Union prioritizes internal sustainability while allowing the enattempt of products grown with substances that it itself deems dangerous, which they see as a display of environmental double standards.
In the livestock sector, the concern turns to alarm when analyzing beef production. European regulations have prohibited for decades the utilize of hormones and antibiotics as growth promoters for fattening animals. In the Mercosur bloc, however, the utilize of certain substances to accelerate the weight of cattle is a legal and technical practice that dramatically reduces the time of raising and feed costs.
Moreover, the animal welfare requirements in Europe, which regulate everything from the minimum space per animal to transport and slaughter conditions, increase the infrastructure costs for Spanish livestock farmers, who watch in impotence as meat produced in large South American industrial latifundia where these protections are absent or merely token is allowed enattempt.
FEIJÓO Lanza un guiño a Agricultores y Ganaderos
Feijóo has attempted to calm the mood by assuring that the People’s Party will always stand beside those who produce, affirming that “Spanish farmers do not fear competing,” but are fed up with ideological rules that prevent them from working on equal terms. The PP leader has criticized Europe’s tfinishency to lead only in regulation and sustainability, warning that this drift could finish up erasing the continent’s welfare.
However, his words find skeptical echoes among farmers who feel squeezed by EU bureaucracy. Spanish farming denounces that they are forced to cut emissions and limit chemicals while a treaty with countries whose agricultural expansion has historically been tied to deforestation of critical areas like the Amazon is signed, creating an ecological paradox where Europe externalizes its environmental impact in return for commercial and industrial benefits.
Food security and traceability represent another fundamental battleground in this dispute. In the European system, each animal has an individual identification from birth, a clinical and relocatement history that ensures any health problem can be isolated immediately. In much of Mercosur, traceability is often grouped or by batches, which raises reasonable doubts about the effectiveness of food safety controls once the product crosses the Atlantic.
Farmers warn that only a compact percentage of containers arriving at Spanish ports are physically inspected, increasing the risk of introducing foreign pests, such as the citrus black spot, which could devastate local plantations and push prices down at source to the point that farms become unprofitable.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
The estimated economic impact of these technical asymmetries is devastating for the rural economy. Producing a kilo of meat or a liter of juice in Spain can cost up to forty percent more than in Mercosur nations due solely to compliance with existing laws. Sectors such as beet and sugar fear disappearing before the onslaught of Brazilian cane production, while citrus growers and stone fruit producers see the agreement as an existential threat. This difference in production costs, coupled with lower wage and working conditions requirements in the South American bloc, creates a vulnerable scenario for the compact and medium-sized family farms that form the social fabric of rural Spain.
In response to this situation, Feijóo proposes a recipe based on simplifying to compete and on ensuring that Europe is not just a regulator, but an innovator and top-level producer. He has harshly criticized the management of European funds by the current government, pointing out that the lack of implementation in strategic sectors such as electric vehicles undermines the competitiveness of the national indusattempt. His defense of internal combustion engines beyond 2035 and his rejection of what he calls “ideological parishes” seek to present him as a pragmatic manager who understands the requireds of the real economy. Yet the contradiction remains latent: deffinishing the competitiveness of the primary sector seems hardly compatible with the total opening of markets to products that do not play by the same technical and ethical rules.
The response from agricultural organizations has been continuous mobilization. Through tractor protests and logistical blockades, the Spanish counattemptside is sfinishing a clear message to both the government of Pedro Sánchez and the alternative led by Alberto Núñez Feijóo: a treaty will not be accepted unless it includes binding reciprocity guarantees. The sector demands that compliance with animal welfare standards, traceability, and the utilize of phytosanitary products be a sine qua non condition for access to the European market. Without these safeguards, they argue that any trade agreement is, in fact, an act of sacrifice of the primary sector in favor of other industrial interests represented by large corporations and the automotive sector.
The tension between market geopolitics and the technical reality of Spanish farms will define not only the viability of the counattemptside but also the map of electoral support in a Spain that demands, above all, the ability to work on equal terms. The outcome of this crisis will mark a before and after in how Europe understands its own sovereignty and the protection of those who, ultimately, guarantee the sustenance of its citizens.
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