On Jan. 24, Solidarité et Progrès, the French political party headed by former Presidential candidate Jacques Cheminade, who is also a leader of the Schiller Institute, issued the following leaflet which party activists and organizers are distributing to farmers throughout France:
LETTER TO FARMERS: “People Should Be Fed, Not Die! Your Revolt Is Our Common Good!”
The current economic system condemns our farms to deliberate euthanasia in the name of financial profit. Between 1955 and 2020, the number of farmers has been reduced by 80%, purchasing power has fallen, and all prices paid to farmers are heading for a collapse by 2024, whether for wheat, corn, milk, sugar or meat. It’s time to change the system.
We must first deal with the effects of the “crisis” with concrete measures, since this is an emergency: Abolish the tax hike on farm-use diesel, get rid of harmful standards, stop imposing European standards, do everything possible to enable young people to set up in business and ensure a fair retirement for the elderly. No crocodile tears, just concrete action on the ground!
But this is only the first step. What you have achieved will be snatched from you, by inflation or by force, if we don’t get to the root causes and change the system.
Going to the root causes means fighting the financial oligarchy, its food and agriculture cartels and its political accomplices. A finance capital that imposes the ecological transition or the Green Deal to eat you alive, between “farm and fork.”
1) Convince the majority of our citizens that we can and must make agriculture a great profession for the future, by uniting producers and consumers against financial manipulation. Defeat pessimism with enthusiasm projects that work for all!
2) Demand a new international financial and monetary architecture that takes power away from the oligarchy and gives priority to mutual development, of which agriculture must be the pillar.
3) Stop the “agro-holdings” that crush us under the pretext of “free and undistorted” competition or hypocritical philanthropy. For example, we must not let the “agro-holdings” invade by means of Ukrainian grains, which don’t benefit the Ukrainian people, but only the financiers who control the land there!
4) Stop the free import of foreign products that don’t respect our production conditions: We find New Zealand milk powder in our products, while our own milk producers can barely survive! We must put an end to “free trade” treaties and conclude bilateral agreements in our mutual interest.
5) Ban bank speculation in the food and beverage sectors.
6) Increase all means to clip the wings of financial vultures.
7) Organize a moratorium on and restructuring of farmers’ debt.
8) Provide producers with the financial resources they need to use the most advanced production technologies and ensure them medium- and long-term markets for their products.
These are just a few ideas. What’s essential is that our farmers get a fair parity price, which enables them to live well and finance their investments without being strangled by their lenders. It also means that the world’s farmers are not pitted against each other in a financial Wild West controlled by crooked sheriffs.
This is not utopian! Without this new system of the common good, we would be condemning ourselves to war. When our leaders talk about war economy, they’re moving all of us to war!
Agriculture is the key to a peaceful future. We support you! We unite with you to make it happen!
