Victory for farmers as EU caves in on net zero
Brussels removes order to reduce emissions linked to agriculture after mounting anger across Europe
THE European Union has caved in to angry protests from farmers, cutting its target to scrap specific agricultural emissions which formed part of the bloc’s net zero drive.
A demand to reduce nitrogen, methane and other emissions linked to farming by almost a third has been removed from a wider Brussels plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 90 per cent by 2040.
Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, yesterday offered a further concession to demonstrating farmers by dropping her controversial proposal to halve pesticide use within six years.
A recommendation urging EU citizens to eat less meat was also removed from the plan.
The concessions were made amid mounting demonstrations by farmers in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Romania before this year’s EU elections.
Spanish farmers joined the movement yesterday by blockading major highways with convoys of tractors and burning tyres.
Meanwhile blockades on supermarket distribution centres have left shelves empty in Brussels, while several people have been injured in traffic accidents caused by farmers’ protests in the Netherlands, as they dumped rubbish and set fires on highways.
Organisers have threatened to continue disruption in the lead-up to the European Parliament elections in June.
The plight of the disillusioned farmers has become politically symbolic ahead of the vote.
To quell their protests, which have sometimes become violent and caused destruction to cities, Mrs von der Leyen acknowledged net zero rules targeting farmers need to be watered down.
“Our farmers deserve to be listened to,” she told the European Parliament in Strasbourg yesterday.
“I know that they are worried about the future of agriculture and their future as farmers.
“But they also know that agriculture needs to move to a more sustainable model of production so that their farms remain profitable in the years to come.”
The Commission president admitted the proposal to cut pesticide use had become a “symbol of polarisation”.
Brussels is also rowing back on planned rules on animal welfare and allowing the cultivation of land left fallow to restore nature. The reduction of nitrogen oxide emissions was seen as a
‘Farmers are trapped in a system that is killing them’
key pillar of the EU’S climate change strategy, which led to the initial wave of farming protests in the Netherlands over the summer of 2022.
The target means farmers will be required to reduce their livestock in order to meet the binding limit on emissions.
Mrs von der Leyen has also tried to get farmers on side by announcing a series of “strategic dialogues” to allow them to voice their concerns directly to EU bureaucrats. Her effort to placate the farmers came after mounting pressure from political allies ahead of the European parliamentary elections.
Manfred Weber, a German MEP and leader of the centre-right European Political Party, of which Mrs Von der Leyen is a member, saied farming communities could shift their allegiances to hard-right parties at the ballot. “We always realised that farmers are citizens and don’t want Left-wing ideologies that dictate everything to them,” he told the European Parliament.
In a letter to the Commission, the Parliament’s Green group said the farmers’ protest movement was “no surprise”.
“The majority of farmers simply cannot make a living from their work,” they wrote. “They are trapped in a system that is killing them.” The Greens also called for Brussels to halt trade talks with South America’s Mercosur bloc, with competition from cheap non-eu products a chief concern amongst farmers.
Maros Sefcovic, a Commission vice-president, said the publication of the bloc’s landmark plan to cut emissions by 90 per cent by 2040 came at a “crucial moment in the debate around the future path of Europe’s green transition”.
“We do recognise the legitimate concerns of citizens and industry over the cost of transition,” he added.