Administrative burdens of the common agricultural policy (CAP), unfair competition from countries with low costs, low wages… Also among our neighbors, the structural difficulties of the sector provoked the anger of farmers in January and February. The highlight was the parade of hundreds of tractors from France, Italy, Spain and Portugal in front of the European institutions in Brussels.
If since then the problems of the sector are far from being resolved, the mobilization has calmed down in some Member States. In Germany, farmers, who are still waiting for support, remain expectant in the face of the political chaos in which the country is mired, while the coalition of Chancellor Olaf Scholz exploded on Wednesday, November 6.
In Spain, anger has largely calmed down since the approval, between April and June, of a series of measures aimed at facilitating the administrative procedures and standards to be respected to receive CAP aid, as well as tax reductions and aid to deal with drought. and the increase in agricultural diesel. On October 8, the Union of Small Farmers and Breeders considered that “The main demand that brought thousands of farmers to the streets has been met”. The damage caused by the terrible floods that hit the province of Valencia at the end of October and the loss of human life, infrastructure and agricultural production are, in any case, the priority that farmers’ associations must now face.
In the Netherlands, sectoral organizations are cautiously evaluating their recent mobilization, but they obtained a very symbolic decision: it was Femke Wiersma, elected representative of the Peasant-Citizen Movement, the agrarian party, who burst onto the political scene. in 2023, who won the position of Minister of Agriculture in July. This political formation aims, above all, to save a sector that had rebelled against the projects of the previous coalition led by the liberal Mark Rutte. The “Nitrogen plan” aimed at drastically reducing the sector’s emissions, with a reduction in the number of agricultural and livestock farms, was notably buried. Environmental programs will be “renewed”; The ambitious plan to reduce the country’s global emissions by 55% between now and 2030 is questioned, which evidently affects the very intensive agricultural sector.
You have 54.84% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
