13-15 April 2027
13th International Food & Drink,
Food Processing and Packaging Exhibition
EXPO XXI Warszawa, 12/14 I. Prądzyńskiego Street
13-15 April 2027
13th International Food & Drink, Food Processing and Packaging Exhibition
EXPO XXI Warszawa, 12/14 I. Prądzyńskiego Street
Is the European Union opening doors to the world for Polish food, or rather letting competition in through the window? During this year’s WorldFood Poland exhibition, leading experts in the agri-food sector gathered for a substantive debate. Strong words were spoken about safety clauses “drawn up at the last minute”, about the asymmetry of veterinary standards, and about the fact that the food sector is the only industry in Poland consistently generating a positive trade balance – and yet remains persistently undervalued. Read the report from the debate that reveals how high the stakes are and why difficult questions must be asked right now.
The WorldFood Poland exhibition brings together, year after year, the people who genuinely shape the direction of the Polish agri-food sector – producers, processors, representatives of industry organisations and politicians. On 14 April 2026, a group of experts for whom the subject of European Union trade agreements is particularly close – not only in theory, but in the day-to-day reality of running a business – sat down together at one table.
The debate, entitled “Challenges in the Competitiveness of the Agri-Food Sector in the Light of New EU Trade Agreements”, was attended by: Czesław Siekierski, former Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development; Andrzej Gantner, Vice-President and Director General of the Polish Food Producers Federation – Employers’ Association; Marcin Hydzik, President of the Polish Dairy Processors Association; and Jerzy Rej, Chairman of the Council of the Polish Meat Association.
The discussion was highly specific. Figures were cited, references were made to EU documents, and frank assessments were offered of what is not working. WorldFood Poland is precisely the kind of place where the industry not only presents what it has to offer, but also speaks openly about what it needs and what it fears.
Table of contents
🟢 Free trade – opportunity or threat? The industry responds
🟢 Mercosur, Ukraine, India, Australia – each agreement is a different story
🟢 EU standards – asset or barrier?
🟢 Polish food sector – a strength invisible in policy
🟢 What needs to change? The industry’s demands addressed to the government and the EU
🟢 Conclusion. What does this debate mean for the future of Polish food?
Free trade agreements, known by their acronym FTA, are arrangements in which two countries or groups of countries agree to eliminate or reduce tariffs and other barriers to the exchange of goods. The European Union has been concluding such agreements for decades and has a clear interest in doing so, as European companies need export markets and the EU economy is too large to close itself off from the world. Today, the number of such agreements stands at approximately 48-49. And this is where the problem begins.
Andrzej Gantner opened the debate with a vivid analogy.
– “I will start with a simple rule that we follow in the Lublin region – I cannot speak for other parts of our beautiful country. The rule goes like this: before you invite guests into your home, you must tidy it up properly, meaning you must prepare yourself for them,” he said.
He immediately added that it is precisely this preparation that is most conspicuously absent. Free trade itself is not the problem. The problem is that the agri-food sector is entering successive agreements without genuinely safeguarding its competitive position. Trade works in both directions – either we sell to them, or they sell to us. For the former to make sense, we must be able to compete on both price and quality. And this, in Gantner’s assessment, is becoming increasingly difficult, driven primarily by rising costs resulting from over-regulation and overly ambitious environmental programmes.
Marcin Hydzik, President of the Polish Dairy Processors Association, approached the issue from a numerical perspective. The dairy industry is export-oriented by its very nature – 30% of production must find markets abroad. Of that export volume, 72% remains within the European Union, with the German market alone absorbing 20%. This illustrates how deeply the Polish dairy industry is intertwined with the EU internal market. It is precisely for this reason that every new trade agreement admitting additional suppliers to that market has a direct bearing on the competitive position of Polish companies.
Hydzik drew attention to something that is easy to overlook when analysing individual agreements.
– “Each one of them, if you put them all together starts to become a problem,” he said.
The quotas granted under a single agreement may appear modest. However, across forty-odd agreements, those modest quotas aggregate into a substantial flow of goods entering the EU market. Polish producers suddenly find themselves competing not with one new player, but with dozens simultaneously – on their own home ground.
The agreement with the Mercosur countries – Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay – has been one of the most hotly debated topics in European agriculture for several years. At its core is the question of access to the EU market for South American beef produced under conditions that are difficult to compare with European ones.
Jerzy Rej of the Polish Meat Association stated the matter plainly. In Poland, every animal is tagged and chipped practically from birth, and its passport follows it throughout its entire life. In Argentina, cattle destined for export are only reported to veterinary services forty days before the planned shipment.
– “This is a completely different world,” said Rej, “and suddenly we are expected to compete with these different worlds.”
His position is straightforward: either controls begin at source, with the exporter, or they must be sufficiently rigorous on this side to ensure that every questionable consignment is turned back. One thing is certain – a few high-profile cases of returned goods very quickly modify the behaviour of exporters.
Do the safeguard clauses written into the Mercosur agreement change anything? Opinion was divided. Andrzej Gantner stated plainly that safety clauses drawn up at the last minute, to political order, cannot be accepted. Food safety is the foundation of the system, not a routine addendum to a trade agreement.
Ukraine is an entirely different case from Mercosur. This is not a distant supplier from another continent. It is our immediate neighbour – a country with enormous agricultural potential and, importantly, with a clear strategy of aligning itself with EU standards. It is pursuing that strategy consistently and successfully. Andrzej Gantner assessed the situation without equivocation.
– “They know perfectly well that they will either sweep us off our internal market or sweep us off our export markets. This agreement will not specify that they may sell this much to Belgium and this much to Poland. They will go wherever it is most profitable, wherever the largest markets are, and that will hurt us badly, because we are there. Agriculture is not purely a matter of economics. What will happen if, through excessive import expansion, we partially destroy our own production?” he said.
This is not pessimism. It is an assessment by someone who has been following the Ukrainian agricultural sector for years. Ukraine will not wait. It will enter wherever it is most profitable, and Poland – as a large market with an efficiently functioning distribution network – is a natural target for them.
Minister Siekierski raised a point that rarely surfaces in public debate. In his view, too little thought is given to what will happen when Ukraine actually joins the Union. This will not be an accession process like Poland’s, because Ukraine is making progress faster and under different geopolitical conditions. Meanwhile, no one is seriously preparing the Polish sector for that scenario.
Not every trade agreement represents an immediate threat. Sometimes geography and mutual interests align in such a way that the matter is simply neutral. This is the situation with India from the perspective of the Polish dairy industry. India is the world’s largest milk producer – accounting for 25% of global output, predominantly buffalo milk. However, India protects its market very tightly and shows no willingness to open up to any meaningful trade with the EU. As Hydzik summed it up: we do not open up, they do not open up, matter closed.
Australia is an entirely different story and an example that came up several times during the debate. Australians are happy to speak about opening their market to European meat quotas, but when it comes to specifics, the argument of ASF – African swine fever – is raised. Poland has for years applied a regionalisation approach that allows exports from disease-free areas. Australia does not recognise this.
– “It is a simple tactic,” said Rej. “They say: yes, we are opening up, but you have ASF. It is a classic non-tariff barrier in a presentable wrapper.”
There is, however, another side to this coin. Rej emphasised clearly that attempts must be made, because this is a two-way game. In recent times, Polish beef has entered the South Korean and Philippine markets – both enormous and highly promising. Poland also wants to access other markets. It is precisely for this reason that, in Rej’s view, closing oneself off from trade agreements simply because they carry risk would be a mistake. The risk must be managed, not used as a reason to retreat from trade.
EU food enjoys a strong reputation worldwide. Andrzej Gantner cited an example that illustrates this well.
– “When I was in Japan on a trade mission, there was one thing that resonated with local partners: the European Union produces safe food — ‘Fukushima free’,” he said.
That was the argument that opened doors to trade discussions. The Japanese, exceptionally demanding when it comes to food safety, treated European origin as a form of guarantee.
This reputation was built over years of stringent standards, inspections and costs borne by European producers. It is not something that can be recreated in a year. It is precisely for this reason that Gantner sounded the alarm – if the Union opens up too quickly to suppliers operating under different standards, it will lose this advantage twice over. First, because cheaper products will enter the market. Second, because confidence in European food as such will begin to erode. And that cannot be rebuilt by any promotional campaign.
The European Commission assures that the new trade agreements contain sanitary and veterinary safety clauses. The industry approaches these assurances with scepticism. Gantner said:
– “I am surprised that these clauses are being established at the last minute, in something of a rescue operation, to calm tensions. If we look at what they concern – and they concern fundamental and basic matters, food safety – this cannot be something that someone does at the last minute because someone somewhere has kicked up a fuss and spilled a bit of milk. Food safety is the foundation of the food system in the European Union.”
There is also the question of enforcing these clauses in practice. The Union has at its disposal the RASFF system – the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed – which functions and identifies problems. However, RASFF responds to what has already entered the market. The question is whether, given the new scale of imports, this mechanism will be sufficient, or whether investment should be made in controls at source, before goods reach Europe at all.
Poland is a border country – the external frontier of the Union. Gantner asked directly:
– “I have not heard of the Union investing substantial funds to significantly strengthen our official food controls.”
This is not a criticism of Polish authorities, but a question about the priorities of EU trade policy. Minister Siekierski added the institutional context, noting that for years in the European Parliament the agriculture committee regularly lost out to the trade committee in advancing its positions. The latter took a view of the overall trade balance and global strategy. Farmers and processors were, in that configuration, an element to be weighed in the balance, not a value to be protected.
– “We lost out in the trade committee because the trade committee took a global view, and I was always faced with the objection: you only look at things through the lens of farmers. Well, of course that was our role as a committee, but that is precisely why this cooperation and coherence is so important – agriculture, raw materials, processing, trade, and also exports, because export requirements are primarily linked to quality and costs, but also to skills, infrastructure, insurance and market connections. The agri-food sector – and I mean both agriculture and processing – has become a source of pride for us.”
Agriculture and processing together account for 16% of Polish GDP. They also represent the only industry that has consistently generated a positive trade balance for years. No other sector of the Polish economy can make that claim.
And yet processing is treated in public debate as a support function for agriculture, rather than as an independent economic force. Andrzej Gantner stated plainly: “It is high time this was given proper attention.” This was not a slogan – it was a diagnosis of a situation in which an industry generating billions in exports still has to fight for its own seat at the table.
Specific figures? Marcin Hydzik provided them from his own field. EUR 4 billion in export value of Polish dairy products – and that figure is growing steadily. Importantly, the structure of those exports is also changing. Instead of powders and butter, an increasing share consists of cheeses and highly processed products – meaning higher margins and less vulnerability to price competition from external suppliers.
Minister Siekierski pointed to the Netherlands as a model worth studying. The Dutch export even goods they do not produce themselves, because they treat trade as a distinct competence rather than a natural by-product of production. It is a skill they have developed over many years and one that is paying dividends today.
In Poland, this element is lacking. Siekierski spoke openly about the need to rebuild economic diplomacy, and about the fact that some diplomats feel embarrassed to represent the food industry. It sounds absurd, but it reflects a real phenomenon. One of the strongest export sectors does not always receive adequate institutional support abroad.
There is also the question of scale. Large export contracts require either large entities or coordinated action among smaller ones. The call for vertical integration of farmers with processing has been raised for years and for years has remained more of a slogan than a reality. Without it, negotiating power is hard to achieve, and without negotiating power it is difficult to enter demanding Asian or South American markets on one’s own terms.
Andrzej Gantner closed the debate with five demands, noting that all of them are achievable within a year. None requires a revolution. Each requires political will.
The meat industry goes even further. Jerzy Rej is calling for a moratorium of at least two years on the introduction of any new regulations. Companies need legal stability in order to plan at all, and regulatory unpredictability is today one of the most serious obstacles to growth.
Marcin Hydzik directed his appeal straight at the domestic legislator: “Let us not finish ourselves off.” He was referring to the extended producer responsibility scheme being pushed forward by the Ministry of Climate. In the dairy industry, where margins are very thin, every additional cost undermines competitiveness. One cannot simultaneously fight foreign competition and domestic regulations that drive up one’s own costs.
Siekierski acknowledged with regret that he did not manage to establish a department of processing and trade within the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. Yet the need for such a unit is self-evident — someone must coordinate activities at the intersection of agricultural production, processing and exports. That coordination is currently absent, and the result is fragmentation and a lack of coherent strategy.
More forceful, however, was his observation about the organisation of the sector. “You are being outmanoeuvred by major retail platforms if you are not organised” – a statement that deserved to resonate more loudly than it did. Retail chains and global purchasing platforms have growing bargaining power over suppliers, and the only effective counterargument is collective action by chambers, federations and industry associations speaking with one voice.
The minister’s conclusion was straightforward: the government must support, defend and advise – not substitute itself for the sector or obstruct it, but equally not leave it to fend for itself against players whose promotional budgets and commercial networks are incomparable with the capabilities of individual Polish companies.
Free trade is inevitable. All participants in the debate were in agreement on this point, regardless of whether they represented the meat industry, the dairy sector, or the food industry more broadly. Polish food needs foreign markets, and foreign markets require agreements. The question is not “whether” but “how” – how to prepare before the stream of imports from South America, Ukraine or Australia hits with full force, before safety clauses are put to the test in practice, and before it becomes apparent that border controls are too weak and economic diplomacy too muted.
Three themes ran consistently throughout the debate. The first: cost competitiveness – without it, no agreement represents an opportunity, because there is no one to send into new markets. The second: quality standards – a form of capital built over decades that the European Union may lose more quickly than it anticipates if it signs agreements faster than it is able to monitor them. The third: the organisational strength of the sector, because individual companies, even large ones, are powerless against global trading platforms, EU trade committees and foreign governments equipped with substantial diplomatic apparatus.
The Polish agri-food sector has the means to compete. 16% of GDP, the only consistently positive trade balance in the entire economy, EUR 4 billion in exports from the dairy sector alone, and a growing presence on the South Korean, Philippine and Indian markets. This is not a sector in retreat – it is a sector that needs adequate institutional backing to maintain its momentum. A processing department within the ministry, a rebuilt economic diplomacy, a regulatory moratorium and genuine deregulation measured in zloty of savings rather than in the number of provisions repealed. These are demands that can be met. What is lacking is the decision to act.
WorldFood Poland is an annual exhibition and forum where the industry not only presents its products but also asks questions that cannot be asked in any other setting. Where a minister sits at the same table as the president of a dairy company and the chairman of the council of a meat association. Where the words “you are being outmanoeuvred if you are not organised” are spoken — and heard. That is precisely why we come here.
