The second term of US President Donald Trump is the establishment of the Monroe Doctrine 2 in the Western Hemisphere. This is a kind of geopolitical ark in the context of global security, which should become a safe haven for world capital.
Like any world-system, this model is formed according to the principle “core-periphery-semi-periphery”. The core is, of course, the USA and Canada. Semi-periphery - countries with sufficiently developed industrial potential, but lacking their own systems of capital accumulation: Mexico, Brazil. As well as the raw material periphery - Chile, Colombia, Venezuela and Argentina (whose industry is doomed to be sacrificed in this concept).
At the same time, the global competition of the world's main clusters consists not only in their own development, but also in some interception of the main resource zones of influence from competitors.
Although the game of chess was invented in the East, now it is an example of exclusively Western geostrategic culture: conventionally white against black, attack on the king, strong and weak pieces, castling and checkmate to the king as the finale of a battle on the chessboard.
At the same time, modern eastern geostrategic culture is a game of Go, that is, the capture of enemy zones of influence and resources. In this game they do not checkmate the king, but seize his geopolitical space and resources in the form of pebbles on the field.
Interestingly, now not only China, but also the EU is trying to play Go.
One of the strategies for playing Go is to prevent your competitor from forming strategic lines - axes..
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In this context, China, trying to seize certain influence over Canada from the United States through a system of trade agreements, is blocking the American axis from Greenland to the Arctic in the north, and the EU, concluding a trade agreement with the Mercosur bloc, is placing its “pebble” on the global playing board in the south of this global cluster.
In fact, the EU is entering Trump’s “personal garden”, trying to intercept his already ripe “cabbage”.
What is the MERCOSUR bloc?.
MERCOSUR, or the South American Free Trade Area, is a geo-economic bloc founded in 1991 and uniting the following countries: Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and Bolivia. That is, MERCOSUR is almost the same age as the EU, but, unlike the European Union, it did not become the prototype of the Bolivarian dream - the Confederation of Free South American States, limiting itself only to trade and economic factors of cooperation. The MERCOSUR countries cover an area of \u200b\u200b12 million square meters. km with a population of 270–280 million people. The bloc's total GDP is approximately $3 trillion.
The core of MERCOSUR is Brazil with a GDP of more than $2 trillion. While Argentina is now at a crossroads - it is quite possible for it to leave this bloc in the future and join the trade bloc with the USA, Canada and Mexico. Associate members: Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Suriname, Guyana. Venezuela's membership suspended (possible renewal soon). Mercosur countries contain over 60% of Latin America's population and 50% of the continent's gross product. For comparison: the EU covers an area of \u200b\u200b4.23 million square meters. km (27 countries, including 20 countries in the eurozone) with a population of 450 million people and a GDP of 20 trillion euros.
MERCOSUR is one of the world's four global clusters, together with the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (Sino-centric Asian project), the North American Free Trade Area (US-USMCA project) and the EU Free Trade Area (European project)..
The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) includes 15 countries: China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam. This is a third of the world economy.
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RCEP could potentially become the largest megacluster of the world economy with a population of 2.2 billion people, almost a third of world trade and a cumulative GDP of $30 trillion.. , which is almost equal to the parameters of the USMCA total gross product (GDP over $30 trillion. ) and the EU (GDP at 20 trillion euros).
In terms of the level of mutual trade, RCEP (42% of trade turnover falls on the participating countries, the rest is relations with the outside world) is still inferior to the EU (62%) and USMCA (50%), but significantly ahead of MERCOSUR (19%).
However, MERCOSUR can catch up with this gap through synergies with the potential of the EU. In this context, trade synergy between the EU and MERCOSUR countries could form a transatlantic geopolitical cluster with a GDP of up to $25 trillion. (which is already approaching the parameters of the USA), with an area of \u200b\u200b16 million square meters. km (which is almost equal to the area of \u200b\u200bthe Russian Federation) and a population of 730 million people (half of China’s demographic potential).
Negotiations on a free trade area between the EU and MERCOSUR were the longest in the history of such agreements - they lasted since the late 90s of the last century. And each time the final point in the negotiations was not reached due to the warnings of European farmers, who were objectively afraid of the flow of cheap agricultural products from South America.
Now the agreement has already been signed, the process of ratification by the parties is underway (the agreement must be agreed upon by all participants in the relevant blocs, in particular the parliaments of all European countries).
As of today, the greatest concerns of European farmers are caused by the supply of Argentine beef, poultry, Brazilian ethanol and sugar..
For example, Brazil ranks third in the world in poultry meat production (about 14–15 million tons per year) and first in broiler meat exports. In general, Latin American countries produce up to 30 million tons of chicken meat, or 28% of world production (but not all of them are members of the bloc).
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One can imagine the fear of Europe, if European farmers were frightened by the export of chicken from Ukraine (our total production is at 1.5 million tons), then what horror they experience in the context of the export of chicken from Brazil (the production volume is ten times more than in Ukraine). Relatively speaking, a Brazilian broiler contains not two drumsticks, but twenty.
But, despite the protests of French farmers, the agreement was tentatively ratified.
Europe expects EU exports to Mercosur markets to increase by €49 billion annually, or 39%, following the agreement.. Several hundred thousand new jobs will be created, European companies will be able to save 4 billion euros per year on duties.
The agreement carries not only risks for EU agricultural producers, but also opportunities: export of alcoholic beverages, olive oil, dairy products. In parallel, the EU is laying down mechanisms for amortizing trade risks, for example, the Farmers Support Fund with resources of 6.3 billion euros. The agreement will stimulate EU GDP growth by 0.1 p.p.. per year and 0.3% of GDP - MERCOSUR countries.
One of the main tasks is to displace China's trade expansion in Latin America: today the MERCOSUR countries import 27% of goods from China and 19% from the EU. And in the EU trade balance, trade turnover with the Mercosur bloc is only 2.5%.
In general, the trade surplus in agricultural and food products in the EU reaches almost 64 billion euros per year and is constantly increasing due to the conclusion of new trade agreements.
The EU also hopes that the agreement with Mercosur will protect the copyrights of European manufacturers across a product line of up to 300 items..
As part of the agreement, Mercosur countries will eliminate tariffs on 91% of goods imported from the EU over ten years, and the EU will eliminate tariffs on 92% of the bloc's exports, in particular tariffs on 82% of agricultural goods. Quotas are set for the supply of goods such as rice, beef, chicken, pork, sugar, ethanol, honey, corn, cheese, milk powder, infant formula.
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A transition period has been established for the supply of passenger cars and some types of industrial goods.
In fact, the EU agreement with MERCOSUR is a very strong bid by Europe to form its own geopolitical subjectivity, because it creates tools for the EU’s geo-economic competition with both China and the United States.
This is also the “funeral” of the EU's eastern enlargement plan. In particular, we are talking about the complete dismantling of the strategy of former German Chancellor Angela Merkel - a free trade zone from “Lisbon to Vladivostok”. Thus, this is the finalization of the Ost plan, which over the past two hundred years, in different variations, has been the cornerstone of the geopolitical expansion of Europe's living space, primarily in the form of expansion in search of raw materials and markets for its goods.
Now the EU is betting on transatlantic expansion, but in the context not of rapprochement with the United States, but of the formation of a free trade zone with Canada in the north of the Western Hemisphere and the MERCOSUR countries in the south.
There Europe will look for both raw materials (primarily energy) and sales markets (the population size contributes to this as much as possible). Moreover, per capita income in countries such as Uruguay is already approaching the modern level of Poland.
In this context, this agreement must be carefully analyzed for geopolitical and geo-economic risks for Ukraine.
In the context of geopolitics, this is the risk of crystallization of the EU’s eastern border and Europe’s refusal to expand to the East. The EU is making a systemic geopolitical turn, changing the key accents of its development.
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In the context of geo-economics, this is huge competition for Ukrainian agricultural goods on the EU market from goods from MERCOSUR countries. We are talking about corn, soybeans, chicken, honey, milk, ethanol (the production of which has just begun to develop in Ukraine with an eye to the European market).
Unfortunately, our officials have not yet made any significant conclusions here.. The only strategy on our part is the hope that the EU-MERCOSUR Agreement will not be ratified by the parliament of any EU country.
However, the EU has placed too many bets on this area of \u200b\u200bexpansion. And one of the factors in the decision to bring Europe closer to the Mercosur bloc and freeze expansion to the East is war.
Ursula von der Leyen, regarding rapprochement with Mercosur, noted: “When two regions like ours speak with one voice on global issues, the world will listen to us.”.
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