The Brief – Fighting for the hearts of Polish farmers
Poland's government is trying to win back the hearts of farmers by claiming that their lobbying has "stopped the inflow of Ukrainian agricultural products”. But their overtures have fallen on deaf ears.
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Politicians never fail to find ways to claim victory after election defeats.
After Sunday’s loss in the Polish presidential elections, Tusk’s shaky government is nonetheless painting itself as defender of the countryside. The Polish People’s Party (PSL), whose Czesław Siekierski is Agriculture Minister, is telling farmers it has prevented Brussels from extending trade benefits to the farming powerhouse of Ukraine. The current duty-free regime will cease from 5 June.
“We have solved the problems with Ukraine. We stopped the uncontrolled flow of grain and restored trade rules,” Siekierski announced on Wednesday 4 June.
And while claiming to have “stopped” imports is an overstatement, PSL highlights a reality widely known in Brussels: national tensions in Poland weighed heavily on the Commission’s trade negotiations with Kyiv.
On Friday, the EU and Ukraine will revert to pre-war tariff quotas on agri-food exports – a blow that will cost Kyiv billions but will largely be taken by Polish farmers as cause for celebration.
In a statement last month, PSL said the day will “go down in the history of Polish villages” and that farmers should be thankful for Poland’s lobbying in the European capital.
“This is a huge success for the government. We have shown it is possible to protect the national interest without turning away from Europe” said Deputy Prime Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz (PSL).
Polish farmers’ fears of being undercut by Ukrainian products ignited rural tensions during the electoral campaign.
“We simply cannot compete with Ukrainian grain,” Polish farmer Maciej Brzozowski told me when I visited the Polish countryside in May. He complained that Ukrainian farmers are subject to far laxer pesticide rules. Marginal groups of Polish farmers are still staging protests about this.
But much as PSL would have farmers believe the tariff victory is their responsibility, around 79% of Polish farmers voted for right-wing populist Karol Nawrocki (Law and Justice, PiS) in Sunday’s presidential run-off. Highly sensitive to this source of frustration, the Commission had treaded carefully in negotiations with Ukraine in the run-up to the elections.
Faced with Nawrocki’s victory, PSL has been quick to blame PiS for farmers’ struggles – saying that Ukraine’s trade benefits were granted when the nationalists were in power in 2022.
“The PiS government (…) agreed to fully open the borders to Ukrainian agricultural products. The decision was made in Brussels without objection, without reflection, without a plan.”
Once again, the PSL is stretching the facts. As Brussels was trying to throw an economic lifeline to Ukraine, the Polish nationalist government sought to please its farmers by imposing an unilateral ban on Ukrainian grain – one that, despite the Commission’s warnings, remains in place.
All this will change at the end of the week, as Ukraine is confronted by pre-war trade restrictions – which Kyiv warns will cost it two-thirds of its 2025 economic growth and lead to unquantifiable “moral” losses.
For the Commission, this is only a temporary stopgap while further negotiations seek a longer-term arrangement. Ukraine hopes for a breakthrough this summer, but Brussels may take its time.
As Brussels stalls and Warsaw stirs, Ukraine will start paying the bill.
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