V4 Farmers’ Organizations Protest Together against EU Agricultural Measures

Czech protesters marching on the road with farm machinery on the Slovak-Czech border in Hodonín, Czech Republic.

Farmers’ organizations from the four Visegrád countries (Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia), along with Latvia and Lithuania, protested against the European Union’s agricultural policy on Thursday, blocking traffic on the roads. The protests were also supported by farmers’ representatives from Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, and Slovenia.

Farmers in Central and Eastern Europe are objecting to the conditions of the EU’s Green Deal and to tax-free imports of agricultural products from Ukraine and South America. Hundreds of Czech farmers on tractors and other farm machinery marched to border crossings with Slovakia, Poland and Germany, bringing, road traffic to a complete halt for a short time Thursday morning and then blocking it.

In addition to the local events, representatives of Czech, Hungarian, and Slovak farmers met in Hodonín to voice their discontent. The joint demonstration on the Slovak-Czech border was also attended and addressed by several representative body leaders of the Visegrád countries.

Hungarian farmers who attended the event held “Wake up Europe!” and “STOP Ukrainian Grain!” banners, while Slovaks protested with whistles, CTK news agency reported.

“Czech farmers would be their own enemies if they did not support greater protection of agricultural land. However, the EU Green Deal must be implemented in a way that its administration does not cause problems for farmers and does not jeopardize the maintenance of agricultural production,” according to a statement issued after the protests by the organizer, the Agrarian Chamber of the Czech Republic and its supporting organizations.

Czech Agriculture Minister Marek Výborný noted that he understood farmers’ protests against EU agricultural policy. “The excessive administration and several unrealistic requirements bother me too,” he told reporters. He stressed that he would convey the views of the protesting farmers at the next meeting of ministers in Brussels.

Speaking at the demonstration at the Slovak-Czech border, Katalin Süle, Vice President of the Hungarian Chamber of Agriculture, detailed the farmers’ demands, saying that the EU plans to extend the free import of agricultural products from Ukraine. She underlined that this is a major problem, because the products from Ukrainian agricultural imports are produced under different conditions and standards than those in the EU.

This puts farmers at an unrealistic competitive disadvantage and destroys the EU countries’ agricultural economies and food production.

She pointed out that this joint action also calls on the European Commission to “listen to farmers” and change its ideas. “The EU’s agricultural policy is a dead end – we need a change for the future of all of us, because without farmers there is no future and no food,” said Katalin Süle.

Jan Dolezal, President of the Agrarian Chamber of the Czech Republic, said that

in total, around three thousand agricultural machines were deployed in the protests, and that the number of protesting farmers was between five and six thousand nationwide.

In addition to the actions at border crossings, hundreds of farmers took their machinery to the streets of major Czech cities, where they also blocked traffic to draw attention to the problems facing the agricultural sector.

Via MTI Featured image: MTI/Illyés Tibor