Thousands of farm producers protest in Madrid with tractors and hunting dogs

Led by tractors and riders, tens of thousands of farmers and ranchers marched this Sunday in Madrid to demand measures from the leftist government in a situation that they denounce as high costs and low profitability of the field.

“Costs continue to rise. We are cattle farmers in extinction” or “SOS mundo rural” were slogans that were read on the banners at the demonstration organized by the Alianza Rural platform, which claims to represent 10 million people from the Spanish countryside.

With Spanish flags and whistles, people traveled four kilometers along central avenues in Madrid, from the headquarters of the Ministry for the Ecological Transition to that of the Ministry of Agriculture, led by a long line of tractors that made their horns thunder.

“This government is a ruin, fuel is increasingly expensive,” Nora Guzmán told AFP, aboard a green tractor from Pozuelo de Alarcón, on the western outskirts of Madrid.

“Today is the beginning of looking for solutions (...) to 80% of the territory we occupy. Enough is enough, stop traveling and the president of the government begins to act,” Pedro Barato, president of the agricultural employer Asaja, told reporters.

Producers complain about rising fuel or fertilizer prices while claiming they have to sell with little profit, while rejecting laws of the socialist Pedro Sánchez government, such as animal welfare, which restricts the breeding of dogs for grazing or hunting.

“Today, animals are protected more than people” thanks to “incoherent and absurd regulations that the government wants to impose on us,” complained Fernando Sáez, a farmer from Córdoba (Andalusia, south) with his hunting dog Cera.

This rural demonstration, which for years has been protesting its economic situation but also the galloping depopulation of large rural areas, received the support of the right-wing and far-right opposition.

“We need a crash plan, a taxation that allows rural areas to survive,” said Cuca Gamarra, spokesman for the Popular Party (PP, Conservatives), the second political force in the Spanish Parliament.

This protest came a day after thousands of protesters, called by Vox's extreme right, protested the rising prices of food, energy and fuel, exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.

On Monday, Spanish drivers declared an indefinite strike over fuel prices, which has led to roadblocks and incidents, while the country's main unions are preparing a national strike for March 23.

you/it