Czech farmers drove their tractors and other large commercial vehicles on Thursday to several border crossings as activists from neighboring countries gathered to protest European Union agriculture policies, overall bureaucracy, and anti-business conditions.
THE EU FARMERS’ PROTESTS HAVE MADE IT TO PRAGUE.
Czech farmers have joined in on the protests against the EU’s DISASTROUS farm-to-fork policies by blocking downtown Prague with tractors.pic.twitter.com/rZx0LIAwsV
— Steve Hanke (@steve_hanke) February 19, 2024
Farmers participating in the protests say the 27-nation EU’s environmental regulations cut their profits and make their products less competitive with non-EU imports.
Farmers say macro-economic tides are against them, with agricultural goods from Ukraine and Latin America flooding their market and lowering the price for their products, putting them at a disadvantage with foreign competitors because of their higher costs of capital, doing business, and living.
The Czech farmers and their colleagues met at one rendezvous after another near border crossings for Germany, Poland, and Slovakia. Farmers from 10 EU countries streamed along the route to the meet-up points from Central Europe, the Baltics, and the Balkans.
The protestors blocked a Czech-Slovak border crossing named Hodonin-Holic with hundreds of tractors. They invited Czech agriculture minister Marek Vyborny, his Slovak equivalent Richard Takac, and similar representatives from Poland and Hungary to meet and discuss European farm policy.
Andrej Gajdos of the Slovak Chamber of Agriculture and Food said, “We don’t protest against the EU. We protest against the wrong decisions by the European Commission.”
Another tractor protest in Dover. Could this be starting to spread? pic.twitter.com/b3FT2PaQcY
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) February 17, 2024
On Wednesday, hundreds of farmers drove their tractors through Madrid, drawing attention to their demands for government policies to address increases in their production costs.
“It is impossible to live from the rural industry, which is what we want, to live from our work. That is all we ask for,” said Silvia Ruiz, 46 — a livestock farmer from the north-central area of Burgos — in comments to The Associated Press.
Desperate and outraged Spanish farmers say the government is not enforcing a law that guarantees fair prices from wholesale supermarket buyers. Meanwhile, consumer prices remain high from post-pandemic global inflation.
“In recent weeks, across Europe, farmers have made themselves heard with a cry of anger, a cry that comes from deep down,” said French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal. “Behind this cry is, most of all, a call for action.”
British Farmers are starting to protest against the government because of cheap imports, insane climate change policies and supermarkets dictating prices.
The farmers intend to hold similar French-style tractor protests in the future.
We must support them. pic.twitter.com/I2rS8b6UGF
— Lewis Brackpool (@Lewis_Brackpool) February 19, 2024
