German farmers paralyze traffic with a tractor protest in Berlin. ‘It’s about everything that has been taken from us’

At the end of the afternoon on Sunday, fires were burning on the Strasse des 17. Juni, the avenue that leads to the Brandenburg Gate, fires everywhere at dusk. Tractors and pick-up trucks are four rows deep on the left and right; Tractors drive back and forth on the two free lanes with banners and flashing lights. At the edge of the road, wood is chopped for the fire, bottles of beer and sausage sandwiches are handed out. It is the major closing demonstration of the farmers’ protest week.

Lutz and Carsten from the Uelzen region stand next to a smoking fire barrel. They have an arable farm there, north of Hannover, where sugar beets, potatoes and grain are grown. They left at one o’clock on Saturday night to arrive in Berlin in the morning after six hours of driving on the tractor. When they left – in a formation of fourteen hikers – there were still people along the road to cheer and wave them goodbye. Carsten, who does not want his surname to be published in the newspaper, says: “It is no longer about the abolished subsidy for agricultural diesel. It concerns everything, and it concerns everyone.”

Diesel plan

The farmers’ protest in Germany flared up in mid-December, when the coalition under Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) proposed an austerity plan in which farmers also had to make cuts. From now on, road tax would have to be paid for agricultural vehicles, and the tax discount on diesel would be scrapped. After initial protests, the coalition withdrew the plan in early January. Tractors and the like would remain road tax-free, and the discount on diesel would expire gradually instead of in one fell swoop.

That was not enough for the farmers. The chairman of the interest group Deutscher Bauernverband, Joachim Rukwied, immediately said that the diesel plan had to be scrapped entirely. To this end, the announced week of protests would continue throughout the country, including the large closing demonstration this Monday in Berlin. Farmers, but also truck drivers and small businesses responded en masse to Rukwied’s call. Last week, an estimated 100,000 hikers took to streets across Germany to protest. During the night from Monday to Sunday in Berlin there is an almost constant sound of honking from tractors arriving in the capital from all over the country. According to a police spokesman, about six thousand tractors occupied the streets in a radius of several kilometers around the Brandenburg Gate.

The demonstrators’ demand is diffuse, the diesel subsidy is now only one of many points. Michael Schulz, an energetic man in his forties, has sheep and cattle in Niederfinow, about seventy kilometers northeast of Berlin. He is the unofficial leader of the protest in his region, consults cooperatively with the police on where to best park their tractors so that emergency services can pass. “It is no longer just about the diesel subsidy,” Schulz also says. “It’s about everything that has been taken from us. Farmers are not quick to anger. And for a long time we meekly went along with everything. But now we can no longer compromise. The barrel didn’t overflow, it exploded.”

Schulz mentions the high prices for food, for energy, for labor. He calculates how much subsidy he receives, what he spends on rent, insurance, electricity and diesel, how many lambs his 250 sheep get per year (on average 1.5) and what he gets for a kilo of lamb (2.75 euros). So it’s not worth it? Schulz laughs mockingly. “It’s no longer worth it, but I do it with heart and soul. Every farmer I know does it because it is his passion. Otherwise you will stop after one year.”

Companies in trouble

According to figures from the Ministry of Agriculture have farmers improved in recent years; according to the latest calculation, incomes increased by 32 percent in 2021/2022 compared to the previous year. Subsidies for agricultural companies in Germany account for an average of 45 percent of the entire income. But usually it is large companies that make significant profits, while small companies are having a hard time. In the past 25 years, the number of farms in Germany has halved to 256,000. Veterinarian Alexandra Leonhardt, who came to Berlin from southern Brandenburg, says: “There are pig farmers, smaller companies, that have not been able to pay my bills for months.”

It is the large farming companies that make significant profits, the small companies are having a hard time

Leonhardt, a young woman with a stud in her lip, stands in front of the Brandenburg Gate, booing Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP). Lindner is the only one from the government who addresses the demonstrators on Monday, but he is booed mercilessly. “Hypocrite” and “liar” the crowd chants. He does not accommodate the demonstrators in terms of agricultural diesel, but promises less bureaucracy and less regulation. Leonhardt waves it away. “Empty promises.”

When Lindner says that cuts must also be made because of the war in Ukraine, the crowd erupts. It upsets many demonstrators that so much money goes to arms supplies for Ukraine. (In Germany, farmers receive about 2.4 billion euros in subsidies annually from Berlin, and 6 billion from Brussels. Last year Germany spent about 5.4 billion euros on arms support for Ukraine.) “Yes, the aid to Ukraine is important, but the quantity is the poison,” says Schulz. His colleague Ronny Schumacher says: “Billions are going to projects abroad. More money must stay in the country.” Lutz from Uelzen, who does not want his surname in the newspaper, also says: “There is nothing left for our own people.”

AfD at number one in polls

For Schulz and his colleague Schumacher there is only one way out: the Scholz government must go. Schulz: “It can’t get worse than this.” In the state of Brandenburg, where they are coming today, there will be elections this fall. “The AfD is going to become a huge force in the states of East Germany,” says Schumacher. “The East Germans will no longer accept this.” In addition to Brandenburg, elections are also being held in Saxony and Thuringia, and everywhere the far-right AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) is number one in the polls.

Traditionally, most farmers vote CDU; relatively few voted in the 2021 AfD Bundestag elections. The party wants fewer subsidies, more of a free market, and moreover a ‘Dexit’; and without subsidies from Brussels, things will become very precarious for many farmers. But last week the AfD suddenly presented a plan that should double the diesel discount instead of abolishing it. Lutz from Uelzen: “All politicians are now trying to make a profit from this protest. The CDU is jumping on the bandwagon, and the AfD is also only using it for itself.”

The largest interest group Deutscher Bauernverband stated that extremists are not welcome at the farmers’ protests. Many people walk with signs saying: “Agriculture is colorful, not brown.” Although there are indeed a few brown symbols, such as the flag of the ‘Landvolkbewegung’, a militant, nationalist peasant movement from the 1920s. A journalist from the Tagesspiegel filmed a demonstrator giving the Hilter salute.

The coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP is already dramatically unpopular, and a continued farmers’ protest will only help the opposition party CDU/CSU and the protest party par excellence, the AfD. How long will the protest last? A man with a gray beard in an army green outfit grumbles: “We are not leaving for the time being.”

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