German farmers are stepping up their demonstrations against controversial new green policies that aim to slash subsidies amid claims that German and European agriculture is being subordinated to an environmentalist agenda by an out-of-touch political elite. Farmers arrived outside Berlin’s famous Brandenburg Gate Sunday evening to kick off what could be weeks of protests.
Farmers across the country strategically placed tractors on highways and in city centres to protest plans by Berlin’s traffic light coalition to reduce several key subsidies for diesel and farming equipment. The agrarian agitation first rearing its head shortly before Christmas. The farmers plan to further escalate the blockades after January 15th if the government does not comply with their demands. They claim these could be the most vocal acts of civil disobedience in the country’s post-war history.
President of the German Farmers’ Association Joachim Rukwied lamented that “agricultural policy is being made from an unworldly, urban bubble and against farming families and rural areas.” Rukwied called on the government to drop all plans to remove the subsidies, saying that otherwise, “the supply of high quality food stuffs is jeopardised,”
Berlin’s Social Democratic-led coalition government last week watered down some of the controversial measures that have spurred farmers into action. The move came as officials scrambled to fill a €60 billion fiscal hole left by a court ruling that declared previous plans to convert COVID spending into green transition funds were constitutionally invalid.
A key target for the farmers’ rage is embattled Green minister Robert Habeck who last week was publicly cornered by farmers as he attempted to leave a ferry at the northern port of Schlüttsiel.
The protests have attracted solidarity from farmers in the Netherlands and Poland, while tech mogul Elon Musk tweeted his support for the German demonstrations on X. There is also the possibility of solidarity strikes by German transport workers have raised the possibility of solidarity strikes as the country buckles under a variety of economic and social crises.
Monday’s protests have also attracted a strong on-the-ground presence from the populist AfD party, while farmers have already been slammed as being ‘far right.’ EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen even insinuated that the demonstrations were a threat to democracy in comments made at a CSU retreat in Bavaria.
The German demonstrations are just the latest flashpoint in a long-running battle between green policymakers and food producers. Most pundits expect agricultural discontent to be a lead issue in next year’s EU elections.
Richard Schenk, a research fellow with MCC Brussels has warned in a recent report that the burden placed by the EU on European farmers was becoming “unbearable” as legislation such as the recently passed Nature Restoration Law prioritises supposed environmentalism over food production in a time of rising prices.