Raquel Villaécija (Chilly Mazarin, Paris region)

(Chilly Mazarin, Paris region)

Updated Wednesday, January 31, 2024-13:42

  • Agriculture The Government urgently calls the agricultural sector after the announcement of mobilizations throughout Spain

  • Protests The French Government points out the unfair competition from countries like Spain or Italy in the crisis of French farmers

The protests of French farmers do not give up and maintain pressure, after the Government, which promised that it would announce measures yesterday, did so in a very lukewarm manner, without specifying them. Tractor blockades remain in place in the Paris belt while the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, warned this Wednesday that he would not let the vehicles get closer to the capital.

The tone is raised on both sides, although the protests, with some exceptions, are being peaceful and that is why the Interior had given the order not to intervene.

There are 100 blocking points and about 100,000 protesters throughout the country

, according to Interior.

To know more

Agriculture.

The French Government disappoints farmers by not specifying measures and they keep their pulse

  • Editor: RAQUEL VILLAÉCIJA (Correspondent)Paris

The French Government disappoints farmers by not specifying measures and they keep their pulse

Economic News.

French farmers light the fuse in Spain: the countryside is already calling protests and pointing fingers at Morocco for unfair competition

  • Editor: CRISTINA ALONSO Madrid

French farmers light the fuse in Spain: the countryside is already calling protests and pointing fingers at Morocco for unfair competition

On the A6, in the Paris region, dozens of tractors have blocked a section of the road, about 30 kilometers, for two days. There are two armored vehicles and several gendarmerie trucks escorting the stretch:

"We are determined to continue

," says a farmer who has been camping since Monday.

"We are watched," says another rancher, who criticizes the bureaucracy and all the rules and controls that have to be passed "in order to produce and access aid. "They are rules upon rules, they force us to be almost lawyers, accountants, computer scientists ...", says this producer, who believes that "it is not a problem that other countries do not comply with our standards. "It is the French Government that must eliminate its overregulation."

About ten kilometers away, the Police have already

detained 18 people

who, with their tractors, have arrived at the Rungis international market, considered the largest wholesaler of fresh produce in the world.

On the political level, the Minister of Agriculture, Marc Fesneau, has announced

80 million in aid for winegrowers

, and has said that the Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal, will detail

more measures in the coming hours

. Yesterday he was expected to do so during his general policy speech in the Assembly, but he focused on ideas such as the "French agricultural exception", without hardly specifying.

He did meet last night with the FNSEA, the main union that is coordinating the protests. Today he will do it with another.

Blockade with tractors in Chilly Mazarin, Paris region.RAQUEL VILLAÉCIJA | THE WORLD

While the blockades continue on more than a dozen roads in the French capital, two other fronts are advancing: that of the farmers trying

to surround Lyon and the procession of tractors that left Agen,

in the south of the country,

early Monday morning .

with the intention of reaching the Rungis market.

They have been driving for three days, even avoiding police barriers. Gendarmerie tanks have been protecting the accesses since Sunday and last night more were deployed on the road that connects with Rungis.

The French Government, which has tried to unblock this crisis without success to prevent it from getting worse, is now putting pressure on Brussels. Fesneau travels to the Belgian city today to address farmers' problems. At the moment Brussels has proposed measures to control imports from Ukraine. Macron meets tomorrow with the president of the European Commission, Úrsula Von del Leyen, to talk, among other things, about the

abandonment of the treaty negotiations with Mercosur

, which France considers contrary to its interests.