Farmers’ organizations are busy organizing protests against plans by which the cabinet wants to significantly reduce nitrogen emissions. The municipality of The Hague does not want tractors in the city.
Action group Agractie, one of the driving forces behind the farmers’ protests of 2019, has called for a massive return to The Hague next week. LTO Nederland supports this campaign and contributes ideas about its implementation, says chairman Sjaak van der Tak.
For LTO it is important that it becomes ‘an appropriate and dignified protest’, emphasizes Van der Tak. “So not in private life.” With this, the chairman of the agricultural and horticultural organization refers to the action of a group of farmers that Minister Christianne van der Wal (Nature and Nitrogen) came to visit at home. As far as Van der Tak is concerned, tractors are part of farmer protests.
The municipality of The Hague does not like the latter. If farmers will soon drive en masse to The Hague by tractor to demonstrate, the municipality wants them to be stopped on the way. The Hague is concerned about the use of agricultural vehicles ‘as a means of coercion’, a spokesman for mayor Jan van Zanen said when asked.
‘Worry about the use of heavy equipment’
In the past, farmers closed the access roads to The Hague by driving to The Hague in convoy. Tractors were also installed in and around the Binnenhof. “In view of previous experience, here and in other places in the country, there are concerns about the use of heavy equipment such as tractors at this demonstration,” the municipality said. “In that case, they must be stopped at an early stage on the highway or starting location.”
The cabinet announced last week that nitrogen emissions in and around protected nature reserves will have to be drastically reduced. In sensitive nature areas with a protected Natura 2000 status, these emissions must stop almost completely. In the ring around these areas by 70 percent. In this way, nature must be given the opportunity to recover. According to Van der Wal, the policy has been out of balance for years.
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