18 THE CAAR COMMUNICATOR Spanish truckers moving goods between Spain and France said that about 200 trucks a day were delayed by the French blockade. Fenadismer, a Spanish transport association, noted that the delay caused an estimated CDN$10.84 million daily in losses for Spanish companies. Along with the standard complaint against cheaper Ukraine goods flooding Spain, the government wants to tell the EU to halt negotiations with the Mercosur trade bloc—an economic and political group featuring Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay—and trade agreements with Chile, Kenya, Mexico, India, and Australia. Another Spanish complaint against the EU is that it has banned a pesticide farmers say they rely on to produce rice. Bomba rice is a type of pearly white short-grain rice used exclusively by the Spanish to make its national dish, paella. Because of the pesticide ban, Spanish farmers say the entire rice crop is threatened by a fungus. Spanish farmers took to the streets in early February with all their protesting ire. Unlike the French farmer demonstration, in which the ag community essentially blocked arteries in and out of the capital city of Paris with their tractors, Spanish farmers are doing things their way. On February 8, 2024, Spanish farmers from the northern city of Vitoria drove their tractors through its streets, disrupting traffic. Stopping in front of the Basque regional parliament, guarded by police in riot gear, the protesting farmers rang cowbells to disrupt the government proceedings. In Barcelona, dozens of farmers spent the night in the city centre before moving to surround the regional parliament buildings in the morning. The day before, convoys of tractors slowly moved on major highways, disrupting traffic flow, but were led by an armada of police vehicles. S ince Tuesday, Spanish farmers have blocked highways and ports in Malaga and Castellon on Spain’s east coast, too—this time physically blocking roads— some 15 main roads—and setting up tire fires across the roads and staging a sit-down protest. Although the sit-in was quickly ended by police and the small, fiery staging of tires across the roads was extinguished and dismantled, no arrests were made as the protest was loud but peaceful. But when protestors trespassed into multiple large goods distribution centres, police felt it necessary to detain a dozen people. Despite the protests and delaying actions, the government and retail associations in Spain said they did not expect imminent food shortages. No one expects the Spanish food shortages. More Protest Action on the Way Portugal also said it would organize protests, though no dates were proffered. The European Union also has plans to stem the tide of member dissent. The EU had previously created rules for its member countries’ farmers to follow to improve biodiversity while addressing climate change. Just before the European farmers’ revolt against the EU broke out, an early draft of a report from the European Union that was viewed by news agency Reuters claimed that member country agriculture must cut non-CO2 (carbon dioxide) emissions by 30 percent by 2040, whatever their country’s 2015 levels were, to comply with the overall climate goal. At least the EU was able to partially read the room of farmer protests across the continent and scrapped that “goal” from the final report draft. But the EU had other plans, including one where crop farmers had to leave four percent of their farmland fallow, not planting anything for one growing season. This “resting” of the soil was meant to prevent it from becoming weak and ineffectual. Yet, at the same time, the EU plan affects farm yield, meaning less farm income and less food for a hungry planet. Not admitting defeat, on January 31, the European Union announced it was “fallow” exempting its farmers for 2024. Farmers would still be able to receive EU farm support payments, but as a concession, they would need to grow crops without applying pesticides. And that’s exactly what the European Union wants, even though Spain is in the midst of railing against it. Fewer to zero pesticides is wanted as European farmers transition to organic farming. Conceptually, organic farming is wonderful, except it takes more land to grow the same amount of fruits and vegetables. The United Nations is also asking countries to produce more food while polluting less. The United Nations and all 196 agreeing countries following suit have not instructed their respective ag sectors how to do that. As in Canada, other governments around the world are requesting technical assistance from private businesses to produce products or methodologies to lower GHG emissions while increasing farm yield without increasing farmer input costs. EUROPEAN AG
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