The Government may well be facing a storm of protests from farming organisations and Opposition parties in the coming weeks over the Mercosur trade agreement, which seems likely to be concluded soon, after 25 years in the making. Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni seems ready to back the deal, signalling just before Christmas that she would seek to reassure Italian farmers that the deal would not be harmful to their interests. Successive administrations have been reluctant to make the case for free trade agreements. This is despite the clear benefits that free trade – now threatened by the policies of Donald Trump – have brought this country. It may be late to make the case for free trade, but in the case of Mercosur the Government may have no other option.
