It’s become a familiar sight in many a European capital: farmers using their tractors to block roads in protest. Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Poland are just some of the sites of such protests this year and last.

An array of complaints

Protesting farmers have multiple grievances. They complain of high costs, including of the diesel fuel heavily used in agriculture, which governments have typically subsidised, and of transport and agricultural fertilisers. They say it’s increasingly difficult to make a living from farming, with profits falling amid high prices. They object to what they see as excessive national and European Union (EU) laws and regulations, including climate and environmental rules.

They also blame food imports from outside the EU, including Ukrainian grain, for undercutting them: the EU temporarily lifted restrictions on Ukrainian grain and other produce after Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022. In response, farmers in Poland have protested by dumping grain. Farmers now fear the potential impacts of a deal the EU is negotiating with Mercosur, South America’s free-trade bloc.

Often protests have been sparked by national-level policies. In France, the most recent demonstrations were activated by a government plan to cut diesel tax breaks. A similar proposal gave rise to protests in Germany.

And these demonstrations have had an impact: the French government shelved a plan to cut pesticides use and dropped its tax changes, while the German administration softened them, committing to make cuts gradually rather than all at once. Last month the EU watered down its draft Nature Restoration Law, which commits to restoring 20 per cent of degraded land and sea areas by 2030, in the wake of protests in Brussels and pressure from right-wing parties. The law may not pass, since several states have now withdrawn their support. Just recently the EU has also proposed a cap on some Ukrainian imports. But these concessions haven’t dissipated disaffection.

One of the challenges for many in civil society is that several of the measures farmers object to have been introduced to try to meet climate and environmental goals. Many governments have promised to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by a target date, and some have been forced to show more ambition due to court cases brought by climate action groups.

One of the biggest shows of protest by farmers in recent years has come in the Netherlands, opposing the government’s introduction of nitrogen emissions cuts, following a civil society lawsuit that found it in breach of EU environmental laws. In this agricultural superpower, the government’s actions have proved hugely divisive. It offered farmers money to cut livestock numbers or close farms, but they protested in their thousands, blocking roads with tractors and spreading waste and hay.

A just transition and a broken food system

The issue behind recent protests in France and Germany, fossil fuel subsidies, is undoubtedly part of the climate problem. By keeping fuel prices artificially low, subsidies help perpetuate the lethal oil and gas industry and slow down the transition to renewable energy use. And their scale is huge: the International Monetary Fund estimates that annual global fossil fuel subsidies amount to around US$7 trillion, over 7 per cent of the world’s GDP.

But whenever governments try to cut subsidies in ways that impose higher costs on those already struggling, people protest. In Nigeria, new President Bola Tinubu announced a shock withdrawal of petrol subsidies shortly after taking office following the February 2023 election, provoking labour strikes. Indonesia’s government faced a wave of protests in 2022 for slashing its subsidies. A sudden end to car-fuel subsidies in Kazakhstan earlier that year saw thousands take to the streets, a rare event in the authoritarian state, forcing the government to quickly reverse its policy.

The same challenge can be seen with other climate and environmental measures, including those affecting agriculture. States make changes, often with reference to climate change, but they don’t provide safety nets or offer alternatives. These means they hit people with the fewest resources hardest.

Civil society wants climate action but calls for a just climate transition – which means moving to an economy that’s fair and inclusive and supporting people through the change – rather than technocratic policy fixes that reproduce existing patterns of unfairness and inequality. Withdrawal of subsidies and other changes must come with alternatives that don’t penalise people.

Many small farmers in Europe are indeed struggling to make ends meet, squeezed by high costs they’re not entirely able to pass on to customers, unable to compete with giant agribusiness concerns and pressured to keep wholesale prices low by huge supermarket chains. They’re also feeling the impacts of climate change, which is making extreme weather such as droughts and heatwaves more likely. They see a sector in decline, with few young people planning to go into farming.

As well as the effects of climate and environmental policies, farmers’ protests call into question the connected and thorny question of food policy. Civil society has long criticised the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), a circa US$60 billion-a-year scheme that provides financial support for farmers. Among the criticisms is that it encourages overproduction, advantages bigger farmers, who overwhelmingly receive funding, and has harmful environmental consequences, including by incentivising pesticides use rather than sustainable practices. Many farmers also see it as overly bureaucratic, top-down and intrusive.

Global south countries view the CAP as a trade barrier that obstructs their exports to the EU. But when the EU does deals to allow more exports from the global south, as is currently on the cards with Mercosur, it’s the turn of European farmers complain they can’t compete.

Recent changes have made few happy. In 2020 the EU introduced a European Green Deal aimed at achieving net zero status by 2050. This included the Farm to Fork strategy, which seeks to make agriculture less harmful to the environment and encourage healthier food habits, but there’s been little progress on this front. The following year, and after more than three years of negotiations between states, the EU changed the CAP to give more focus on rural development. Environmental groups criticised it as a missed opportunity and accused the EU of greenwashing, with the changes failing to make progress on greenhouse gas emissions cuts, while many farmers saw the changes as adding to their burden.

From both an agriculture and climate perspective, the world food system clearly isn’t working. The planet is simultaneously home to crises of hunger and obesity. Ultra-processed foods are linked to numerous health problems. Agriculture, forestry and other forms of land use account for almost a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions and food miles – the distance from farm to plate – are a significant contributor too, disproportionately caused by food imports by global north countries. It’s a global problem that needs a global solution, but that isn’t on offer. Instead, much more narrow national and regional approaches are being pursued that globally are incoherent.

Far right joins the bandwagon

Political forces are making global solutions less likely. Right-wing populist and nationalist parties – such as France’s National Rally and Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD) – are trying to co-opt farmers’ protests for political advantage. Far-right groups have reportedly taken part in protests in Germany and Poland.

In the Netherlands, a new right-wing populist party sprung up, positioning itself as the political representative of protesting farmers and coming first in provincial elections in March 2023. It proved the most enthusiastic backer of a failed bid to put far-right populist politician Geert Wilders in power following the country’s December 2023 national election.

Far-right parties consistently oppose climate action and are rising in the polls across Europe. They expect to make significant headway in June European Parliament elections, which will only make reform to tackle the climate crisis and fix the food system less likely.

Far-right parties and groups by no means speak for all farmers, who cover the political spectrum. But they’re the loudest voices, and they’re dragging the spotlight way from the reasoned debate needed.

There’s another important point of view that must be heard. Europe is home to vibrant mass climate movements calling on governments and companies to urgently cut greenhouse gas emissions, stop using fossil fuels and ensure a just transition.

But in a disturbing trend, climate protests are being treated differently to those staged by farmers. European states that used to have good records of respecting people’s rights to protest and express dissent are increasingly repressing the climate movement, including through introducing anti-protest laws, criminalising activists and vilifying them. This has often come in retaliation to tactics such as roadblocks and other forms of non-violent direct action that protesters use to communicate the urgent need for action.

The climate movement can see that when farmers use similar tactics of non-violent disruption they aren’t being targeted with the same level of repression. In the Netherlands, police have detained thousands for taking part in roadblock protests to demand the government keep its promise to end fossil fuel subsidies. Farmers blocking roads with their tractors haven’t faced detention in anything like the same numbers. In the UK, the same ruling party that passed a suite of laws targeting climate protests also recently supported a roadblock protest by farmers in Wales, where it doesn’t control the devolved government.

Farmers have a right to protest. But rights shouldn’t be applied selectively: everyone’s protest rights must be respected.

Looking ahead, there’s a need to find the common ground between the climate movement and farmers – particularly small-scale farmers already concerned about sustainability – in Europe and around the world. In Italy, farmers recently protested to demand support in the wake of a destructive drought, pointing to the joined-up response needed. Cutting environmental regulations ultimately isn’t going to stop the decline many small-scale European farmers are experiencing, and it can only worsen the disruptive impacts of climate change on their livelihoods.

Patchwork solutions aren’t going to work: comprehensive policies are needed to deal with the many facets of the problem at the global level. An urgent debate is needed about reforming the global food system as part of a just climate transition.