BERLIN (dpa-AFX) – At the previous Chancellor’s visit to the Green Week, the mood was not exactly relaxed: Shortly before the agricultural fair, farmers protested with anger in their stomachs against the end of agricultural diesel benefits. The chancellor at the time was Olaf Scholz from the SPD, and his trip to the big food industry show in 2024 was intended to send conciliatory signals. The diesel subsidy has been back since the beginning of the year – and now the new chancellor.
Friedrich Merz (CDU) comes to the halls under the radio tower in the afternoon for a tour. It quickly becomes clear: it won’t be an extensive tasting tour along the stands with international specialties, perhaps in keeping with the tense world situation. First, the Chancellor takes a snack and a small tomato when greeting farmers’ president Joachim Rukwied.
Up close and personal with “Ukki”
The trade fair tour leads to several industry associations. Merz doesn’t climb into tractors that are waiting, but he does find out about, for example, a precision seed drill for precise field work or an electric tractor with replaceable batteries. This gives you a feeling for how technological developments have also found their way into agriculture, he says later. Three dogs are brought up to the hunting association’s stand and Merz courageously pets the German longhair “Ukki” and the other two.
In terms of cuisine, the trade fair tour is largely sparse. The employees of a show bakery, where Scholz’s predecessor made a plaited dough, can only see the Chancellor from a distance through a window. In the hall of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture owned by CSU man Alois Rainer, Merz tastes salt in the flavors of vegetables and chili. The serious situation is echoed when he emphasizes at the end that agriculture must be protected for food security. “Everything is no longer self-evident.”/sam/maa/DP/mis