Demonstrations by farmers against the Dutch government: tractors in the streets against short-sighted politics
The Dutch government announced on Friday a large plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions related to nitrogen and its compounds in parts of the country, infuriating farmers. Nitrogen emissions will have to, or rather should, decrease by up to 70% in 131 key areas – most of them close to nature reserves and protected land – if the Netherlands is to meet its environmental targets in 2030, the government said. .
“The goal is a living campaign with a healthy nature,” explained Minister of Nature and Nitrogen Christianne van der Wal in a statement. “For this reason a radical but necessary transition of rural areas is necessary”. “ For farmers, this means that emissions will have to decrease by 40%. That means around 30% fewer livestock, ” public television NOS said. Obviously the farmers did not take it well, many of them should fail, and so they took to the streets with their tractors.
video_2022-06-11_18-54-31 (video-converter.com)
Other demonstrations are expected in the coming days. The Netherlands is a major contributor to Europe's greenhouse gas emissions, particularly nitrogen. This is partly due to the large number of herds grazing on its plains. The small country of 17.5 million inhabitants has a large animal population: nearly four million cattle, 12 million pigs and 100 million chickens. The Netherlands is the second largest agricultural exporter in the world after the United States.
Agriculture is responsible for 16% of the Netherlands' greenhouse gas emissions, mainly due to fertilizers and manure. "We understand this will have a huge impact on farmers," Prime Minister Mark Rutte said at his weekly press conference on Friday. “This sector will change. Unfortunately we have no choice, we have to reduce nitrogen emissions.
The country's 12 provinces must now prepare suggestions, which they will present next year, to reduce emissions from livestock, construction and traffic. The government has allocated € 24.3 billion, part of which will be used to provide financial assistance to farmers.
However, from a broader perspective, the measure appears senseless and absurd: one of the reasons for the world food crisis is the lack of nitrogen compounds, nitrates, used in soil fertilization. The Netherlands produces "Too many", but these would be very useful, indeed necessary, in other countries, such as, for example, Brazil or India. These fertilizers would be very useful to keep agricultural production high, but it is easier to ban in Europe than to think of something actually useful.
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The article Farmers' demonstrations against the Dutch government: tractors in the square against a short-sighted policy comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/manifestazioni-dei-contadini-contro-il-governo-olandese-trattori-in-piazza-contro-una-politica-miope/ on Sat, 11 Jun 2022 17:01:52 +0000.