Name: Committee on International Trade Ordinary meeting
Uploaded: 2026-11-04T13:33:04+00:00
Duration: 16097 s

00:09 - 03:31

Speaker 1

Dear colleagues, good afternoon. Welcome to the second part of our INTA meeting today. And I will, well, I had already jumped in instead of Chair Bernd Lange, who is taken by other commitments, so please bear with me this afternoon, at least at the first part of our meeting. And we have point 9 on the agenda, which was adopted this morning, which is the state of play of EU-Ukraine trade relations. This is an exchange of view with the Commission representatives.

And just to give you a few elements of context, and to give some context to this afternoon discussion, we would like to find out more and to discuss the state of play of EU-Ukraine trade relations. We would, of course, include in this the challenges that Ukraine's economy and Ukrainian exports are facing currently. Of course, we just, as the European Union, we reaffirmed our commitment to supporting Ukraine in the recent October European Council. And trade is an essential part of Ukraine's economic resilience, its recovery, and also its European future. So, we have, as you know very well, our Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area, which was revised, and in this form is in force since October 2025.

It provides a stable framework for our trade relations. So, we will try also this afternoon to take stock of the implementation of this DCFTA and the way that bilateral trade is developing. Two issues are particularly relevant today when we look at geopolitics and when we look bilateral relations: the impact of the new EU steel measures, and the overall situation in the Black Sea. A new market access regime for steel imports, including from Ukraine, was put in place. Committee, our INTA committee discussed this in July.

And also, we discussed how those new measures are tackling global overcapacity. We would like to hear now how these measures, including the new TRQs, are affecting Ukrainian steel exports and industrial recovery, and what impact the CBAM might have on those tendencies. In the Black Sea, attacks on ports and shipping continue to disrupt Ukraine's agricultural and industrial exports, including steel and iron ore. Of course, they are also disrupting the economies and the societies of the EU member states in the region, including the member state I know best. In anyway, October European Council also addressed these concerns, calling for safe passage for commercial vessels and stronger EU-Ukraine solidarity lanes, and action to prevent stolen Ukrainian grain from entering the European Union.

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