GREEN POLICIES DESTROY FARMERS’ LIVES
Farmers are experiencing the unfortunate results of the “Green” policies of the United Nations mandates. I am sure you have heard about the problems in the Netherlands which have caused many farmer protests. Now, however, the farmers in Ireland are also under attack as well as other European countries.
Ireland’s coalition government has reached a bitterly contested deal to slash climate emissions from the country’s key agriculture sector by 25 per cent by 2030. This will mean a dramatic cut and cost to Irish farmers of $2.2 billion with no designated budget to help farmers transition. The government is proposing the killing of 65,000 dairy cows each year which will not be replaced. The president of Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association said the agreement made “whole classes of farms unviable” and would push up prices. |
Then, on June 10 of this year, the Dutch government unveiled more extreme measures targeted directly at the agricultural industry. “Farms next to nature reserves must cut nitrogen output by 70%,” the Economist reported. “About 30% of the country’s cows and pigs will have to go, along with a big share of cattle and dairy farms.” Can you image a dairy farmer getting rid of 70% of his dairy cows? No more milk, no more income, and no more farm.
In the Netherlands, a bill to reduce nitrogen emissions will cost the tax payers $1.6 billion just for purchase of farmlands, but will eventually cost the citizens more through higher food prices on beef, pork, sheep meat and dairy products that will have to be imported. |
In addition, the government will offer farmers, who are located near a preserve, 100% of the value of the land with an addition 20% incentive if they sell their farm by February of 2024. After that the government will make use of eminent domain to take over the land and sell it to special interests who will farm according to the government’s “green” rules and raise only those crops that are a part of the “green” world order, such as bugs. The final blow is, however, the requirement that these farmers, once they sell their land, can NEVER farm again in the European Union!
Why, you may ask, am I writing this on the Local Conservative page? Green policies will eventually come to farmers in Colorado because we have been sucked into the Democratic “green” fear that our sister state, California, is dealing with. They are being monitored by satellites that report on cow burps for methane emission. They must decrease emission by 40% by 2030 and hope to do this by expending hundreds of millions of dollars on digesters that convert animal dung to energy.
Why, you may ask, am I writing this on the Local Conservative page? Green policies will eventually come to farmers in Colorado because we have been sucked into the Democratic “green” fear that our sister state, California, is dealing with. They are being monitored by satellites that report on cow burps for methane emission. They must decrease emission by 40% by 2030 and hope to do this by expending hundreds of millions of dollars on digesters that convert animal dung to energy.
In May, a Colorado court ruled that the state’s Department of Public Health & Environment violated state and federal laws by failing to protect waterways by monitoring provisions in a statewide water-pollution permit for concentrated animal feeding operations. Now, I am not a big advocate for factory farms but the point is that many animal rights groups, global warming theorists, vegan and vegetarian groups, and bug consumers are leading an attack against methane production and pollution of water by cattle production. Their solution is the reduction of animal meat. They have been very successful in Idaho, Washington, California and elsewhere.
Factory farms are a dangerous source of water pollution in Colorado, partly because the state’s lenient permits don’t require proof of compliance. There are about 100 factory farms in Colorado that maintain a Clean Water Act permit, but have not been held responsible for protecting our water. Rather, they have operated under catch-me-if-you-can policy. Many climate advocates say the most cost-effective way to help the climate through agriculture is simply to farm less land and raise less livestock. Some go as far to say that animal farming is destroying the planet. If the “green” policies continue to grow, it will come to Colorado’s meat industries. Then we may be forced to follow the farmers abroad and in Canada in protest. |
In response to new legislation, about 40,000 Dutch farmers in 2022 protested outside government buildings and the homes of ministers and drove hundreds of tractors to blockade food distribution centers including warehouses and grocery stores. Throughout July of last year the movement spread to Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland, and other nations, each with farmers taking to the streets in repudiation of their governments’ measures to reduce the scale and output of the agricultural industry.
The idea that these proposed changes will make any difference to the global climate is questionable. Will the expectations be accepted worldwide? Will India give up its sacred cows? It is made even more absurd by the insistence that it must be achieved by 2030, giving little time to make changes that might head off the cull.
Farmers have to unite as one. The crisis affecting Irish and Netherland farmers and other farms throughout Europe and Canada is most troubling and dangerous for the world. To assume that U.S. farmers won’t be next is ludicrous and short sighted. It’s either sink separately or swim together. Support farmers’ groups and legislators than support farmers! The fight is on. KLN |