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Farmers protest with tractors on Paris streets: "No Country Without Farmers"

 


Angry French farmers drove their tractors in protest into the streets of Paris on Friday 23 February 2024 – on the eve of the Paris Agricultural Fair, one of the world’s largest farm fairs. French President Emmanuel Macron will visit the Paris Agricultural Fair on Saturday for the “big debate” with farmers, supermarket managers, and environmental groups. The farmers are peacefully, but noisily, demanding more government support and simpler regulations. 

 

Carrying the farmers’ union flags of “Rural Coordination” into the suburbs of western Paris, the protestors headed towards the Vauban Plaza in central Paris. The protest is three weeks after the farmers lifted roadblocks around Paris and the countryside after the government offered over 400 million euros (USD $433 million) to address their grievances over low earnings, strict regulations, and competition from abroad. 

 

This current protest is part of a broader protest movement in Europe against the European Union (EU) agriculture policies, bureaucracy, and business conditions. The farmers say that the 27 countries of the European Union have environmental policies which are perceived as unfair, such as the “Green Deal” which calls for limits on the use of chemicals and on greenhouse gas emissions that make their products more expensive than non-EU imports.  

 

Government officials held meetings in January and February with farmers’ unions to discuss a new bill to defend France’s “agricultural sovereignty” which will be debated in parliament this spring. This includes government aid, tax breaks, and a promise not to ban pesticides in France that are allowed elsewhere in Europe, which French farmers say puts them at an unfair disadvantage. Part of the current protest in Paris and across France is aimed at putting pressure on the government to implement its promises. 

 

Some of the protest signs include: “As a child we dream, As an adult we strike” – “Save our Countryside” – “Country, countryside, countrymen: all with us” – “No country without farmers” – “Eat French.”















 

MARTINA NICOLLS

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Martina Nicolls is an Australian author and international human rights-based consultant in education, healing and wellbeing, peace and stabilization, and foreign aid audits and evaluations. She lives in Paris.

 

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