A safeguard meant to shield farmers from fertiliser price spikes under the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) has been voted down by the European Parliament — but Irish MEP Seán Kelly says he still expects it to survive the negotiations that will settle the law.

In a vote this week the full parliament rejected the safeguard by 362 votes to 272, with 25 abstentions. The proposal, put forward by the European Commission, would have allowed products to be temporarily removed from CBAM's scope in exceptional circumstances that could harm EU markets and push prices too high.

CBAM, in force since January, is in effect a tax on imports of carbon-intensive goods into the EU, fertiliser among them: importers must buy certificates to bring product in. Farm organisations have argued that the cost lands on growers at a time when nitrogen prices are already high.

Kelly, a Fine Gael member of the European People's Party, said the vote showed how split MEPs are. "While parliament supported the deletion of the article, a majority of 362 to 272 is not a convincing one, and it leaves the [Socialists and Democrats] with a weak mandate on the matter heading into trilogue negotiations," he said. The S&D group had led the push to remove the safeguard.

"My own group was similarly split, with 45% of EPP MEPs voting to preserve the safeguard," Kelly added. "I think this level of support will be significant at the negotiating table, and we will ultimately end up with a clear safeguard in place that will enable us to act to protect our farmers from possible extreme price impacts of CBAM."

The parliament now goes into trilogue talks with the member states in the Council of the EU on the final text of the updated CBAM legislation, where the safeguard's fate will be decided. Charles O'Donnell reported for Agriland.

Source: Agriland