Promoting Sustainable Agri‐food Trade: What the EU Can Do

Summary Agri‐food trade has contributed positively to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially in economic terms, but growing concerns over environmental and social harms have pushed the EU to pursue new governance efforts at multilateral, bilateral, and unilateral levels. This Point de Vue critically assesses the strengths and limitations of different governance pillars in a global landscape marked by geopolitical uncertainty, rising economic nationalism, and weakening multilateral momentum, taking into account evidence from the two Horizon 2020 projects MATS and TRADE4SD. Despite limited appetite for formal multilateral solutions, the EU could build on open plurilateral initiatives to form ‘coalitions of the willing’ around higher environmental standards. Bilateral Free Trade Agreements remain a promising avenue if framed not as compliance tools, but as partnerships based on mutual benefit and shared priorities. Unilateral measures can play a role if they are targeted, evidence‐based and WTO‐compliant – but they should be used sparingly and strategically. Ultimately, trade governance alone cannot resolve the sustainability challenges embedded in global agri‐food supply chains; a mix of trade and non‐trade measures, including capacity‐building, investment and cooperative partnerships, will be essential.