Tractors rumble in streets again ahead of EU polls. Farming is a big issue and the far right pounces
Tractors are rumbling through the streets again days ahead of the four-day European Union election
BEERSEL, Belgium — The far-right Flemish Interest party had set up the demonstration in the picture-pretty rolling fields south of Brussels, ahead of the four-day European Union election starting Thursday. The goal was clear: Decrying how farmers would lose fertile land to what they see as overbearing environmentalists trying to turn it into a chain of woods, killing off a traditional way of life.
It was also another show how agriculture has been instrumentalized by the populist and hard right groups throughout the 27-nation bloc.
In a final push on Tuesday, militant agricultural groups from more than a half dozen nations were converging on Brussels in a show of force that they hoped would sweep the progressive Green Deal climate pact off the table and give farmers the leeway they had for so long in deciding how to till the land. There too, the impact of the far right was clear, with representatives from several EU nations attending the protest that drew hundreds of tractors.
At last week's small protest south of the capital, farmer Eduard Van Overstraeten was growling. “As a farmer, you have just been turned into a number,” he said. Of the 60 hectares (148 acres) he used to farm for wheat, corn and potatoes, he said he was forced to sell a quarter of it — including his farmhouse — to help make a string of distinct woods around Brussels to become one continuous nature zone to improve biodiversity and fight pollution.
Similar stories of discontent, centering on limiting use of manure and pesticides to forcing parts of farmland to be kept pristine nature zones for the benefit of birds and bees — and eventually the
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