In a supportive article, Preußische Allgemeine Zeitung reports that farmers in Poland have made clear that they longer want to be patronized by Brussels—neither by the Green Deal, or “zielony ład” (green order), nor by the Ukraine policy, both of which the EU is pursuing at the expense of agriculture in Poland. If the EU is justifying duty-free imports of grain from Ukraine as the result of the war in Ukraine, the Polish farmers insist that “We are demanding compensation from the war fund in the form of subsidies for grain, rapeseed, milk, fertilizers and higher subsidies for fuel,” said Grzegorz Bardowski, who is known throughout Poland as a regular presence on a TV show. “Ukraine can swallow Polish and European agriculture without batting an eyelid. If it is said that Ukraine can feed the whole of Africa, what is Europe to them?” he asked, pointing out that half of Ukraine’s agricultural land is owned by foreign agricultural holdings, of which 360,000 hectares are registered in Luxembourg, 670,000 in Cyprus, and 200,000 in Saudi Arabia. “Do you think that the income from these holdings will stay in Ukraine?” demanded Bardowski, who also listed the pesticides used in Ukraine that the EU had declared are harmful. “And then we are also supposed to leave 4%of our soil fallow. What an absurdity! ... Enough is enough!” he raged. It must become worthwhile for farmers to produce again.
If the general strike farmers launched on Feb. 9 does not have the desired consequences (which it has not so far), the next one has been planned for Feb. 20. On Feb. 9, tractors blocked roads in 300 villages in all voivodeships, including on the border with Ukraine.
