Australia will try to salvage trade talks with the European Union while stepping up complaints that the bloc has so far “offered too little and asked too much”.
The assistant minister for trade, Tim Ayres, will meet European counterparts on the sidelines of the G20 trade summit in India this week with the goal of getting the negotiations back on track.
Speaking before departing Australia on Wednesday, Ayres said the two sides “ought to get on with it”. But he warned that a free trade agreement would only be possible if Australian farmers gained much greater access to the EU market.
“The message is really clear: we want to conclude this agreement,” he said in an interview with Guardian Australia.
“But the agreement that was put to Australia in Brussels just six weeks or so ago offered too little and asked too much.”
After the trade minister, Don Farrell, admitted during a speech in Melbourne on Tuesday that the negotiations with the EU had been “hard work”, Ayres also complained about restrictive European import quotas.
“It would take 60 years for each citizen of the European Union to have enough beef to consume one Australian steak,” Ayres said.
“The market access is so small currently. What I want to see is a commercially meaningful deal for Australian farmers that lifts the level of access.”
Ayres insisted it was “absolutely in the interests of Australia” to reach a free trade agreement with the EU if those obstacles could be overcome, describing it as “a huge market of 450 million, mostly middle-income consumers”.
The German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, told an Australian audience on Tuesday night that both sides should now strive to finalise the agreement.
Addressing a Lowy Institute webinar, Baerbock said the EU needed to diversify its trade links because China was “not always as predictable, transparent and reliable as is needed to allow a stable economic relationship”.
Baerbock said Australia had been “a role model” in resisting economic coercion from China. She pointed to critical minerals as a key area for further EU cooperation with Australia.
“More than 90% of the lithium mined in Australia is exported without further processing to China, while the EU imports more than 90% of its processed lithium needs from China. So the key question is: how can we diminish this risky detour?”
The G20 trade and investment meeting will be held in Jaipur on Thursday and Friday, followed by a business summit in New Delhi on the weekend. The Business Council of Australia and other Australian organisations are part of the delegation.
In addition to holding talks with European representatives, Ayres has kept open the possibility of meeting with his Chinese counterpart amid ongoing attempts to “stabilise” Australia’s relationship with Beijing.
Ayres said the scrapping of China’s hefty tariffs on barley was “a very good development” but if such a meeting occurred he would press “in a very direct way” for the removal of other trade barriers, including on wine and seafood.
Ayres said he would also use his visit to maintain momentum for a more comprehensive trade agreement with India. This was previously mooted by the end of 2023 but Ayres said he did not want to set a deadline.
While Ayres “certainly won’t” be meeting his Russian counterpart on the sidelines of the G20, he said Australia would take every opportunity to condemn the illegal invasion of Ukraine.
The war had created “economic and security shockwaves” including food security challenges “that we are going to have to keep attending to”.
The G20 meeting was occurring “in a challenging environment” including global economic headwinds.
Ayres said it was “an opportunity to keep building consensus” to reform the World Trade Organisation. That issue was brought to a head by the US refusal to appoint members to a key appeal body.
Asked whether he was disappointed with the US position, Ayres said he and Farrell would “keep encouraging our friends in the United States” and other countries to adopt a package of reform at a key WTO meeting early next year.
“I don’t think you make progress by expressing disappointment, you make progress by making the case and building consensus.”
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, is due to attend the G20 leaders’ summit in New Delhi next month, with speculation that could include a second meeting with China’s president, Xi Jinping.
