The farmers' protest in France is bearing fruit. In the afternoon, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced “10 emergency measures” to calm the anger of the 72,000 farmers who took to the streets, forcing tractors to retreat from the cities.
“I am making a very clear decision: to drastically simplify our measures and rules when they are not clear,” Attal said, announcing “ten immediate simplification measures” to respond to farmers’ protests.
On the occasion of his mission in Montastruc-de-Salies in the Haute-Garonne department (80 km southeast of Toulouse), Attal addressed the agricultural world and announced, among other things, that he wanted to do so put an end to the “increase of non-road diesel” for agriculture.
He also announced the start of “a month of simplification over the next three weeks.” “The prefects,” said the 34-year-old new prime minister, called to calm farmers’ protests, “will bring farmers together to see what can be simplified.” . At government level we will see what we can simplify, with the aim of a bill on agricultural advice.”
“To demonstrate this to you, I have decided on 10 immediate simplification measures starting today,” Attal assured at the time. The Emmanuel Macron supporter cited, among other things, the following: simpler procedures for the cleaning of agricultural waterways and on the conditions of judicial appeal. He then guaranteed that, as part of the complex negotiations with the world of industry and large corporations, the Paris government would impose “three very serious sanctions” on companies that violate the so-called “Egalim laws” in order to protect farmers' income distribution . “The goal – he said – is clear: to repeat egalim everywhere and without exception.” He then announced a tightening of controls and promised to exert “maximum pressure” on the ongoing negotiations of all actors. He then wanted to reiterate that “France is clearly against the signing of the trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur”.
Attal also announced €50 million in “emergency aid” to respond to organic supply chain difficulties
Following the Prime Minister's announcements, protesters began pulling back tractor blocks in several cities in France, such as Bordeaux, Montpellier or Lyon. “Officially it is time to return home,” a spokesman for the Fnsea union in Hérault, the Montpellier region in the south of the country, told France Presse, while the union's reaction at national level is still awaited.
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