Farmers protest in the Netherlands

[pieter]

In my Arnhem yesterday


Dutch farmers in all provinces went to the headquarters of the Provinces.



The actions continue and might become more radical or aggressive

[pieter]

A Farmers mass forced their entry into the Province House of the Province of Groningen

The farmers shout: "Boeren, Boeren, Boeren.." meaning "Farmers, Farmers, Farmers..."

Confrontation between the Groningen police and Groningen farmers

[pieter]

Farmers riots can be fierce in Europe. A powerful arm in their possession are their tracktors, powerful machines.




Here the farmer protest in the Low Saxon Assen Province in the North-East. Here you see how large the farmer movement is.
The farmers use traktors, trucks and other agricultural vehicles.


The Dutch flag is from top to bottom Red, white and blue, out of protest the farmers turned the flag upside down, so Blue, white and red.

[pieter]

Farmer attacks muncipality building in 2016

[pieter]

[pieter]

And the farmer protests continue


Farmers from the Wadden Islands on their way through North and South-Holand to The Hague in South-Holland


Tonight farmers all over the Netherladns are again on their way to The Hague

[pieter]

This are clearly Frisian farmers, because they have Frisian flags on their tractors

[pieter]

[pieter]

Today, wednesday 16 october there will be mass farmer protests again!

[pieter]

Live: Mass demonstration farmers in The Hague


The strike leader called the farmers members of the FDF, which means the Farmers Defence Force. They play typical farmers hard rock with a singer who sings in an Eastern Dutch Low Saxon farmers dialect, and they also play Southern Dutch carnavals music.

[pieter]

A Dutch farmer on the stage said he talked with French farmers. The French farmers told him 'When do you take action, when are you going on strike.' Whel we did, he says.

Farmers gather in the Capital The Hague




This farmer protest movement is rather Populist, but different than the Rightwing Populist movement. It is a new kind of rural farmer Populism. But Geert Wilders of the Dutch Rightwing Populist Freedom Party is the most Popular politician amongst the radical farmers. Nex to that the Christian Democratic CDA party and the Christian Evangelical Christian Union are popular amongst farmers. They hate the Pro-Climate Protest movement left, the centre left and the centrist and centre right government parties D66 and Prime minister Rutte's VVD.

[pieter]

Farmers gathered early in the morning in Arnhem


Polish farmer reads statement for the Dutch farmer for large crowd of Dutch farmers. Polish speakers (Jaga) listen from 26:36:


I wonder if this Dutch farmer protest will become European. You see still the national differences. Here you see that the Dutch farmers are still very focussed on Dutch regional issues, because they react rather lukewarm to the Polish farmer. That is because they were for a specific reason over there in The Bilt and waited for some answers of Dutch officials. Some of the leaders of the Farmers Defence Force I find rather primitive and simplistic in their vocabulary and reasoning. That is sad, because I know very intelligent, hard working and dedicated Dutch farmers in Zeeland and Gelderland. Also ecological green farmers.

[pieter]

There is a huge resentment in the rural regions against European regulation from the Hague and Brussels. Like in the USA you have a gap between the Midwest states on one side and the East Coast (San Diego, LA and San Francisco) and the West-Coast (New York) on the other side. In the Netherlands you have a huge gap between the rural countryside and the large cities area de Randstad ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randstad ) in the West and the Industrial and ICT cities Eindhoven, Groningen and for instance Arnhem and Nijmegen. Arnhem city is also very different than the surrounding rural Gelderland province. Within the provinces you have the differences between rural -farmland- area's and the cities or towns. In Groningen you have the difference between Groningen city (also called Amsterdam of the North, a city Island in an area of rural provinces in the countryside) and the larger rural Groningen province. The larger province of Groningen is largely rural with a lot of villages, hamlets and small agrarian towns, while the city Groningen is an island on it self.

The rural agrarian people of the Groningen province are called "Landjers" (meaning people of the land, country people, rural people), while the people of Groningen are called "Stadjers" (meaning city people).

The present protests and farmer rebellion is a protest which is rooted in sadness, a feeling of humiliation, a feeling of being treated badly, having a bad name, and a feeling that all environmental pollution and climate change is blamed on the farmers. They are fed up by the strict Dutch national and European regulations, and the fact that it increasingly becomes very difficult to become a farmer. A lot of Dutch farmers live under great stress, pressure, are fighting to survive and have witnessed several crisises with the bird flu, then the Classical swine fever, and the Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as mad cow disease. There were a lot of psychological problems amongst Dutch farmers and a lot of suicides after these huge crisis for Animal husbandry farmers who produce meat, fibre, milk, eggs, or other products. There was a suicide wave amongst Dutch pig farmers in that time. A lot of them lost all of their Livestock due to these diseases. All their chickens, pigs or cows were killed and destroyed. The profession farmer is under pressure in the Netherlands. A lot of farmers moved abroad during the last 70 years after the Second World War. To the USA, Canada, Australia, South-Africa, Southern-America, Poland, the Ukraine, Sweden and Norway. Farmers were forced to stop their business. Children of farmers stop being a farmer, because they went to primary schools, highschools and university and became towns and city people, civil servants, entrepreneurs, horeca people, employee's, politicians, military, police officers, teachers, doctors and nurses. It is very hard to be a farmer today and that is why the Dutch farmers are so furious, and that's why the 'Farmers Defence Force' Protest movement came to existence.

P.S.- That suicide wave amongst pig farmers took place because many of them had fallen below the poverty line. They worked very hard, but the losses of live stock, the increasing national and European regulation and the tough agricultural market destroyed their farm enterprises and their income. Hidden poverty is a huge problem within farm communities. People are ashamed that centuries old farms, many generations of work, are going under.

[pieter]

Dutch farmer explains the farmer protests of the last 2 weeks