Our newest trade partnership might force us to take our Paris Agreement commitments more seriously.
New Zealand became a footnote in European Union history this week when we were the first country to sign a Free Trade Agreement with the bloc under its new framework on trade and sustainable development.
The EU and NZ will, for example, seek to co-operate on climate solutions while holding each other accountable for the commitments both countries have made under the Paris Agreement.
That's important because the agreement is voluntary and non-binding. It was the only way the United Nations could get developed and developing countries to sign up to the accord in Paris in 2015 after decades of unresolved debate about their respective climate responsibilities.
Under the Paris Agreement, each country makes its own 'nationally determined contribution' to solving the climate crisis. The hope was that peer pressure would help them live up to their pledges. Eight years on, though, only a handful of countries are on track.
New Zealand is not one of them. In fact, the scientists at Climate Action Tracker reckon our policies and performance are consistent with a near 4C rise in global temperatures.
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By comparison with us, the EU is far more ambitious on climate change and has far better developed policies and programmes to tackle it. As our fourth largest trading partner, there's the chance they offer us plenty of carrots and sticks.
But there are also reasons for worrying that won't happen. For example, for all the EU's ambition about "green and just economic growth" the bloc is struggling to progress the principles in other trade negotiations, apart from those with Australia and Sweden.
A far bigger concern, though, are the fast-shifting climate politics within the EU. On one hand, the bloc is continuing to show climate leadership on its multifaceted "Fit for 55" programme, which is aimed at delivering a 55 percent reduction in emissions across the EU by 2030.
Fit for 55 involves almost all aspects of EU economies, including: reforms to the EU's emissions trading system; a gradual introduction of carbon border adjustment mechanisms (tariffs on some categories of high emission imports to level the playing field for lower emission EU producers); binding commitments to reduce emissions from land use; investment in sustainable aviation and other green fuels; and all new buildings being zero emissions by 2030 and all existing buildings by 2050.
No other country, or group of countries, can match that level of climate ambition.
The trouble is that on the other hand, the European politics of climate are getting ever more difficult with the rise of right-wing parties across the continent.
This week’s example is the fall of the Dutch coalition government of Mark Rutte. He had led a string of coalitions for 13 years, making him the longest serving Dutch leader.
Rutte met his demise over immigration and will lead a caretaker government until November's general election. But with 20 parties vying for seats, forming a new coalition will be an immense challenge for any party leader. Massively divisive issues include the Netherlands' urgent need to cut nitrate pollution by its highly intensive farming systems.
Spain is another example of a political battleground on climate issues. It goes to the polls on July 23. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of the Spanish Socialist Party called an early election after local elections in May showed a sharp swing to the right.
Likewise in Germany. Opinion polls show support for its Green party has fallen in the past year from the low 20s to the mid-teens because of some of its policies and growing tensions with its coalition government partners. Meanwhile, Alternative für Deutschland, a far-right party with slogans such as “Roll back mad climate laws!” has doubled its support to 19 percent.
As we head for our general election, the latest polls show National starting to pull away from Labour. It's already clear from the two parties' positions on climate that should National form the next government with Act as its coalition partner, they would unwind Labour's already weak response to the climate crisis.
Theoretically, a new right-of-centre government could decide not to follow through on the legislative steps required to lock us into the new trade deal with the EU. That would be very foolish because there are plenty of other gains from the pact, including for the primary sector.
That said, the dairy sector was particularly dismissive of the deal when the two countries agreed terms last July.
“The combination of very small quota volumes relative to the market size and trade-restrictive in-quota tariffs has this deal falling well short of being commercially meaningful for the dairy industry,” said Malcolm Bailey, chair of the Dairy Companies Association of New Zealand. In effect, the EU market is 98.5 per cent closed to key New Zealand dairy products, DCANZ, said.
Still, if the EU can continue to work through the very challenging politics of its member countries, it will continue to deliver good climate policies, including ones on farming, food, forestry and ecosystem restoration.
Those would be an immense challenge to our farmers. They would have to sign up for similar policies here if they wanted to justify being among the best farmers in the world.
