Despite massive nationwide farmers’ protests almost five months ago, the Dutch government plans to shut down thousands of farms to comply with the European Union’s demands. “The Dutch government plans to buy and close down up to 3,000 farms near environmentally sensitive areas to comply with EU nature preservation rules,” the British daily Telegraph confirmed on Monday.
In July, thousands of Dutch farmers protested by building Freedom Convoys on the highways. They blockaded supermarket warehouses, leaving shelves stands empty across the country. The police acted heavy-handedly in quelling the protests and, in one instance, even fired shots at a farmers’ convoy.
The state-backed “emission reduction” drive in the Netherlands is part of a more extensive EU climate campaign as Brussels doubles down on its radical globalist agenda despite a record rise in food and fuel prices across the Continent.
The UK’s Telegraph further reported:
The Netherlands is attempting to cut down its nitrogen pollution and will push ahead with compulsory purchases if not enough farms take up the offer voluntarily.Farmers will be offered a deal “well over” the worth of the farm, according to the government plan that is targeting the closure of 2,000 to 3,000 farms or other major polluting businesses.Earlier leaked versions of the plan put the figure at 120 per cent of the farm’s value but that figure has not yet been confirmed by ministers.“There is no better offer coming,” Christianne van der Wal, nitrogen minister, told MPs on Friday. She said compulsory purchases would be made with “pain in the heart”, if necessary.The Netherlands needs to reduce its emissions to comply with EU conservation rules and agriculture is responsible for almost half the nitrogen emitted in the proud farming nation. (…)But the new plan looks set to reignite tensions with farmers over nitrogen reduction. (…)Farmers fear that the plan to slash emissions by 2030 will cost them their livelihoods, oppose any compulsory purchases and argue farming is unfairly targeted while other sectors such as aviation are not.Farmers’ lobby group LTO Nederland said trust in the government “has been very low for a long time”. It accused the Government of drafting “restrictions without perspective”.
The Netherlands’ government is presenting the plans as a buyout bid, which farmers fear could be the first step towards forcible “expropriation” of their farms.
The news outlet Dutch News reported on October 6:
Farmers’ activists have warned disruptive protests will return if the government goes ahead with plans to force hundreds of businesses to give up in order to cut nitrogen pollution.‘The expropriation of farmers must be taken off the table,’ Mark van den Oever of Farmers’ Defence Force said after the government-appointed negotiator, Johan Remkes, published his recommendations on Wednesday.‘We will not allow enforced buyouts to happen.’ Van den Oever said he would wait to see if the ministerial council adopts Remkes’s plan to include compulsory purchases among its options for reducing the number of farms by between 500 to 600. Remkes argued there was no other way to meet the target of cutting nitrogen compound emissions by 50% before 2030.
Faced with a government-backed climate onslaught, Dutch farmers are organizing themselves politically. They have fielded a new political party called the Boer Burger Beweging (BBB), or the Farmer-Citizen Movement.
Founded in 2019, the BBB has succeeded in creating a nationwide footprint. “In next year’s provincial elections, which will also decide representation in the Dutch senate, or Eerste Kamer, the BBB is fielding more than 300 candidates in all 12 provinces. In recent polls, the party ranks fourth of the 17 leading parties in the Netherlands,” the UK-based Guardian newspaper reported earlier this month.
The leftwing British daily worried that the new Dutch party could inspire farmers in other European countries to fight back politically. “But the rapid rise of a pro-farming party, in a country where desperate attempts are under way to cut pollution from livestock farming, illustrates a political development that could be replicated elsewhere, observers say,” The Guardian feared.
The leftist fears are well-founded. This year’s Dutch protests were backed by farmers in neighboring Germany, with German Freedom Convoys blocking motorways in the Rhein region.
Video: Dutch farmers’ protests, July 2022:
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