French farmers are slowly building up their protest against the government over several issues, including rising costs and tighter regulations. The protest is becoming the first crisis new French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal has to cope with, while opposition far-right party the National Rally is trying to capitalise on the anger as part of its election campaign for the upcoming European elections.
Last week, farmers in southwestern France blocked a portion of the A64 highway in Toulouse in protest and unknowns blew up the windows of a local government building in Carcassonne. Protesters said that they are willing to spread the protest across the whole nation, moving to block Paris and disrupt the famous Paris International Agricultural Show when it opens on February 24.
Farmers are demanding that the government addresses several issues, including a tax increase on agricultural diesel. Another gripe targets EU directives, as they often make French national standards even stricter than European ones. They are worried that all of these directives are hampering competition. Protesters also called the EU’s main agricultural subsidy programme, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) as dysfunctional.
The government is trying to respond to the protest. It decided to delay a series of reforms that it announced a year ago that were supposed to help struggling farmers. In addition, Attal visited the Rhône department on Saturday and met farmers there, before a meeting in Paris with the FNSEA and the Young Farmers Union last Monday.
Despite the efforts, the National Rally is sowing the discontent among farmers ahead of the European elections. “The European Union and the Europe of Macron [want] the death of our agriculture,” said MEP and president of the National Rally Jordan Bardella. He was speaking in the wine-growing region of Médoc, where he spent the weekend meeting local farmers.
