Hundreds of tractors rolled through the streets of Milan and Brescia in Italy yesterday. Videos and pictures posted on the web evoke images from the Netherlands, although on a smaller scale. (Italy is much larger than the Netherlands and stretched; it is virtually impossible to concentrate all farmers in one place. Therefore, protests are occurring on a regional basis.)
Dairy farmers are demanding that the government stop punishing them for producing milk. In particular, they are being sanctioned for producing more than the EU-established quotas, despite the fact that the EU Court of Justice has ruled the sanctions are illegal.
Roberto Cavaliere, head of Copagri Lombardy and organizer of the demonstration, said that the “aim of the protest is to sensitize citizens, the regional administration and central government to the importance of quickly achieving a shared solution that brings an end to almost 30 years of uncertainty that has damaged producers.” Some TV news broadcasts interviewed farmers who warned that agriculture is being destroyed and soon there will be no food on supermarket shelves. Some signs on tractors read: “Draghi, agricoltura abbandonata, popolazione affamata” (Draghi: abandoned agriculture = a starving population.”
According to police, the tractorcade succeeded in blocking traffic in Milan’s main streets, such as Piazza della Repubblica, Corso Buenos Aires and Viale Tunisia. The Milan-Brescia demonstration follows similar demonstrations in Southern Italy last week. Such protest actions, with tractors rolling down highways and through cities, focus on different aspects of the same problem that unites farmers internationally: The EU Green Deal, and like programs on other continents, is destroying agriculture.
