RE: Are disruptive protests counter-productive?
Ah, @bengy, I had to come and read this. I live in the land of protest action, which action is not confined to tractors disrupting traffic, but a whole lot more including rocks in the road, burning tyres, stone-throwing and the like.
First, I'll nail my colours to the mast. The Husband is a former commercial farmer. That said, in the late 60s into the 70s and he was ranching beef in the then Zimbabwe for a British multinational, their management took a principle decision not to make use of things like growth hormone to speed up the growth of the cattle. Similarly, all the cattle they produced were sent to slaughter from pasture and not from feedlots. He subsequently was involved in small scale dairying, pig and trout farming and when he retired he was in the poultry industry. He was responsible for rearing point of lay pullets. He loathes the production of broilers which, he says, is inhumane. Oh, and he has enormous respect for Dutch farmers and some of their practices - he had to do with some when he was still working.
All of that said, I agree with @abitcoinskeptic: the world needs commercial farmers because people need to eat. Cities cannot feed themselves - even with urban gardening. I also agree with @free-reign that the big commercial farmers - certainly here - do overdo everything. We see it in the big fruit and grape producers around the village that spray and fertilise, and, and, and... There are the smaller producers who use more sustainable methods but they cannot produce in the same quantity.
What I don't get is food dumping - just because it's a surplus and people don't know what to do with it. There are so many parts of the world where food is scarce and it occurs to me that the world probably produces enough food, and it's the distribution that's a problem. As usual it's a matter of politics and Politics, I suspect. And, of course money and power.
We will be converting our plot next door into a little market garden. The goal is to be natural, but because the environment has been so screwed up, it's going to be a bit of a tall order. We will grow enough for our own use and for sale. It won't be huge quantities and, I have no doubt that there will be surplus at some point. I will have to be pickling, freezing, preserving that. Those products will also be for our own use and for sale.
This brings me back to the farmers. My understanding of farmers is that they are, by and large, quite bovine (ha!) and slow to rise. So, by the time they actually do protest, like yesterday, they will probably have exhausted every avenue and have now been provoked to such an extent that they see no other option.
Hope there weren't too many blockages today. Think of us in South Africa: scheduled electricity outages are back - for at least the next week. Going to have to plan life around all of that!
Fiona
Sounds like you guys were on the more sustainable end of farming practices... something that got lost in the intervening decades though... the balance had definitely shifted to volume and profit over other concerns... how that ended up is neither really here nor there... the point is that in general, we are perhaps overbalanced for those outcomes, and it will be painful to readjust the balance. That goes to the points of @abitcoinskeptic and @free-reign... of course, it would be ridiculous that we would adjust overnight... but there will be pain for everyone, farmers will see cuts in either income or the available techniques open to use... and consumers will (and should) pay a higher price for food in return... I don't think it is going to be a pain free transition away from destructive industrial farming. The trouble is that no one wants any of the adjustment pain (normal reaction....)... I can't speak for farmers, but as a consumer of food... I am resigned to the fact that I will need to (and should...) adjust my buying habits (or pay a premium) and eating habits if I want to be part of the solution (and in turn, I think that food producers should be encouraged by market forces and regulation to act in a more sustainable way). However, not everyone thinks this...
Food dumping is a crazy waste... I'm not sure that it is politics... I think it is more to do with marketing (I think that marketing is the bane of the modern world... the idea that selling a product gets to be more important the actual product itself!)... people want good looking food in the first world, and the rest gets wasted. Unfortunately, this should be a market problem (as long as it isn't unsafe to eat...)... have the good looking fruit/veg... and have the bad and funny looking things. Price them differently... see what people will actually buy if given a choice!
It is quite possible that the farmers here have reached an impasse in negotiations... and that they have felt that this is their only recourse... of course, I don't think that people do things because they are counter-productive... but perhaps there should be an analysis of whether this sort of thing is productive or is polarising. After all, it is hard to negotiate on a polarised topic (see Climate Change... or anything like that....). After all, doing something (protesting) when you are backed up against a wall doesn't mean that the outcome is better than the status quo....
Anyway, as far as I understand this specific topic. If the farmers are being unfairly (tricky word that one...) singled out for a larger share nitrogen cuts over other sectors... then yes, I tentatively support this cause. But I would support the idea that cuts are raised across the sector to come up to the farmer's levels... not the reduction of farmer's levels to match the lower cuts elsewhere. However, that said... I'm not across the nuances of this particular problem (it's a bit tricky in a different language!)... so, I'm not really sure that I can intelligently comment.
Food dumping, I regret to say, is both money and politics. It has huge impact on the agricultural sectors of countries like South Africa. The poultry industry here is taking a great deal of strain. Google the term and see what comes up.
Anyhow, all of that said, seems we all agree that we need to go the sustainable route. The sooner, the better.