"We do not see a European Union or a Ministry focused on agricultural issues and, therefore, we have to be critical." He is Carles Peris, general secretary of LA UNIÓ Llauradora i Ramadera, whose fighting image in the February protests became a symbol of the mobilizations in the Valencian Community. Yesterday he appeared with the rest of the representatives of the Valencian agricultural associations to show their rejection of European policy and to announce that there will be more mobilizations. "Why are we going to continue on the streets? Europe has continually deceived us," said Cristóbal Aguado, president of AVA-ASAJA, at whose headquarters the joint press conference was held in which the Peasant Coordinator of the Valencian Country also participated ( CCPV-COAG) and the Union of Small Farmers and Ranchers (UPA-PV), as well as Agro-alimentàries Cooperatives of the Valencian Community to point out that this will also be, as was the month of February, an agricultural spring.
Although they did not give dates, they did explain that they will be "punctual and relevant events." In Castelló de la Plana they plan an event "in front of a commercial area", they foresee a tractor parade in Alicante from Elx to end in the Port of Alicante and another mobilization in the city of València with tractors, passing by the Ministerial Delegation of Agriculture and even the Government Delegation in the Valencian Community, which "is the one who must bring the voice of our demand to Brussels," Aguado highlighted.
The objective is to extend this pressure in the streets until the European elections, where they insisted yesterday a lot is at stake. "We think that even after the June elections we will have to continue fighting, depending on how the situation turns out. Let Europe decide if it wants agriculture or not," acknowledged Cristóbal Aguado. That is why they ask that in the "starting positions" of the European candidatures there be profiles with agricultural experience.
"We will try to work between now and June to talk about the sector; our desire is to integrate our proposals into the program," Peris said. They hope to meet with the parties represented in the Corts Valencianes, as well as with the main authorities, from the Presidency to the Department of the branch, which they criticized for not having enabled "any extraordinary measures." A criticism that joins that made to the Ministry led by Luis Planas, who according to what they said "has announced 18 measures, all insufficient," according to Peris.
José Vicente Andreu, president of ASAJA-Alicante, spoke about the role of Europe and its influence on Valencian agriculture, pointing out that the announcement of environmental flexibility in the CAP regulations last Tuesday "has almost no impact" on Mediterranean agriculture. . "We ask for a change in the excessive importance of the environment because farmers are the first conservatives of nature," said Andreu.
Also Ricardo Vayo, general secretary of UPA, described the scenario in which the sector promotes more mobilizations. He stressed that both climate change and the war between Ukraine and Russia, and then that between Hamas and Israel in Gaza have done "nothing but increase our production costs and in that sense we believe that even though there is a chain law food, this is not giving the results that are expected and we believe that more progress must be made. He explained that there are unfair practices, payments in more than 30 days, rounding, prices that include VAT, unjustified waste or 3% brokerage payments, which "happens a lot in citrus fruits," which suffocate the sector.
However, the sector sees with optimism the response of the Valencian Ports and State Ports, which committed to studying and reviewing bonuses to third parties after the February protests.
