Johan Remkes’ conciliatory words will not be enough to convince the radical part of the farmers. Now it is important to prevent that the benevolent part of it becomes the victim.
For Johan Remkes it must be a strange sensation. Already in the autumn of 2019, at the request of the then cabinet, he clearly explained the Dutch nitrogen problem: for three decades, the Netherlands deliberately violated European agreements on protecting nature and restoring biodiversity. After that, the ship turned and in the meantime no building permit is issued as long as the government cannot demonstrate that it is really serious. His most important assignment to the cabinet: start with a major remediation of livestock farming in the immediate vicinity of the Natura 2000 areas, which creates space to then work on the transformation to less intensive livestock farming.
Three years later he was there again. With the same message on Wednesday: ‘We are at the end of the legal options. The only way to unlock the country is to restore nature. That requires, in the short term, much less emissions.’ That he was nevertheless received as a savior in political The Hague can only be explained by the total deadlock in which nitrogen policy has ended up in the intervening years. The atmosphere between cabinet and farmers had become so bad that only a new face could get the conversation going again.
Words matter. Remkes understood that very well. That is why he used his podium on Wednesday in the first place to rectify the lack of communication from the cabinet and to put a heart to the farmers. They are primarily victims of faltering and ‘sometimes failing’ government policy, he emphasized. ‘Some of the farmers experience that they are now being put into a corner as a loser. As if it’s all their fault.’ And: ‘The Netherlands is a country of and for farmers.’
Money and, if necessary, coercion
Those conciliatory words, however, could not hide the fact that the message is unchanged and even sharpened a bit. Because if the government wants to meet farmers with barn innovations and other measuring methods, and also wants to return their permits to the 3,500 small livestock farms with low nitrogen emissions, there is only one thing to do: end emissions in a very targeted way within a year. from 500 to 600 large ‘peak loaders’ near nature reserves. With the help of a lot of money and if necessary with coercion.
The latter is not just part of Remkes’ recommended strategy – it is the foundation on which all other recommendations rest. The first reactions from the radical farmers’ organizations immediately showed on Wednesday that this point threatens to swallow all the attention and that the cabinet should have no illusions: any form of forced remediation is unacceptable for some of the farmers, how much money, fine words and ‘perspective’ the government also opposes.
These will again be actions with tractors on the highway, with all the inconvenience that entails. It is now important for the cabinet and the House not to be distracted by this and to concentrate on the livestock farmers who do want to think along. Because in the end, most of the farmers will be the victims if the government falters again. In Remkes’ words: ‘Postponing the assignment will lead to less prospects. Not till more.’
The position of the newspaper is expressed in the Volkskrant Commentaar. It is created after a discussion between the commentators and the editor-in-chief.