European Union governments put off giving their verdict on the EU’s draft trade agreement with Canada as they sought more time to overcome a political split in Belgium. Trade ministers from the 28-nation EU discussed the Canada accord on Tuesday in Luxembourg while separate talks continue in a bid to address concerns in Belgium’s French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The pact, the EU’s first commercial deal with a fellow member of the Group of Seven leading industrialized countries, needs the support of all the bloc’s governments as well as the European Parliament to take provisional effect in 2017. “Talks are intense and they continue,” European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem told reporters after the ministerial meeting. “If I didn’t think we could solve the Belgian issue, we wouldn’t keep on engaging with them.” At stake is an accord known as the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, or CETA, that the EU says would boost its economic output by about 12 billion euros ($13 billion) a year and expand EU-Canada trade by about a quarter. Beyond that, any collapse of CETA, which took five years to negotiate, would take the steam out of a series of separate free-trade talks that the bloc is pursuing with the U.S., Japan and other countries. Walloon Reservations The U.K.’s plan to leave the EU hovered over the Luxembourg meeting because trade is a core European policy and the bloc’s push over many years to use its economic weight to open markets worldwide has been a central argument for the merits of membership. Should the EU falter in ratifying the deal with Canada, the bloc risks losing credibility both with global partners and with a host of its own trade-friendly member nations long allied on commercial matters with Britain. “If in a week or two we see that Europe is unable to sign a progressive trade agreement with a country like Canada, then with whom does Europe think it could do business in the years to come in this post-Brexit situation when there are many questions about Europe’s usefulness?” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said last week, according to Radio Canada International. Wallonia, which accounts for less than 1 percent of the EU’s population, wants CETA reopened to add safeguards. The stance is tying the hands of the Belgian federal government, which is in favor of CETA.  “There are of course bigger things at stake than only this agreement,” Malmstroem said. “It’s about the credibility of the European Union to conclude trade agreements in the future.” The Belgian wrangling is set to make its way onto the agenda of a meeting of EU government heads in Brussels this Thursday and Friday. Malmstroem said that gathering is where the issue will have to be resolved. ‘Slow Procedures’ German Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel dismissed the prospect that the EU-Canada pact could collapse. “I don’t think the agreement can fail,” Gabriel told reporters before the Luxembourg meeting. “A little more time is needed.” Some room for compromise may be offered through a declaration that the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, has been drafting to accompany the trade deal. On Oct. 5, commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said the declaration would soothe unease over CETA in some EU nations. Malmstroem signaled that she expects EU governments to endorse the trade accord by the time of a summit with Canada that’s tentatively scheduled for Oct. 27. “The Canadians have been very patient,” Malmstroem said. “It’s not easy. We are 28 and we have slow procedures.”