Ms Sinéad McPhillips:

No, for the EU as a whole. It could be used for farmers impacted. The recent MFF or EU budget proposals for the period 2023 to 2034 came out in July. They include a €6.3 billion crisis reserve to deal with all aspects of crisis in the EU over that period. There was a specific reference in that to trade agreements, and, I think, to Mercosur in particular. There was not a ring-fenced amount for Mercosur. It is likely there will be a high bar in the context of accessing any of the funding from that crisis reserve. It would only become available if the safeguard measures that we have talked about and that are included in the agreement in terms of price and volume of imports were found to have been met. That is when that safeguard would trigger.

Another point to consider is the full impact of those market concessions would be phased in over the six years of that tariff rate quota introduction. The 99,000 tonnes will not arrive in one big bang; they will be phased in over six years from adoption.