WHEAT growers will hit the streets on February 21 in protest at government indifference towards their plight. The decision to take decisive action was reached yesterday, while the details on where and how will be decided at a later date, they said.
Wheat growers have criticised the government for its indifference towards the threat of financial ruin in the farming community since EU accession.
The wheat growers say they have the backing of the farming community as a whole, while olive producers were last night expected to announce their own protest measures against government policy.
Wheat growers’ spokesman Kyriacos Kailas said farmers were calling on the government to provide them with financial support.
“We will decide within the week what measures to take and where,” he said.
Farmers from various agricultural sectors have merged under an umbrella group dubbed the ‘Struggle Co-ordinating Committee’. The group feels their collective livelihoods are under threat and have criticised the way the Agriculture Ministry is handling the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy.
The committee has argued that farmers’ incomes are just half the average income of the country but they are being asked to foot the cost of accession.
A committee spokesman, Georgios Kamilaris, argued that farmers’ incomes had reduced drastically in the last year to the point where they could no longer cover their immediate needs and obligations to the family. He charged the government with acting with indifference and apathy.
“Instead of addressing the real issues faced by the farming world and providing solutions, (Agriculture Minister Timis Efthymiou) is resorting to populism, with the aim of dividing the people into farmers and anti-farmers. It is common practice lately, that when the powers that be are in a tight spot, they use the EU as an excuse for everything, depending on each case,” he said.
Wheat growers argue that increases in fuel, low wheat production and abolition of wheat subsidies after EU accession are crippling their trade, and are demanding greater assistance to cover their losses.
Efthymiou has told the farmers that the government was doing all it could to support farmers by exhausting all legal means under EU law, which does not allow subsidies. The minister claims the government kept to its side of the bargain regarding financial assistance for wheat production.
If the protest goes ahead on February 21, this will be the second time the wheat producers take to the streets under this administration after talks with the government culminated in a march on the Presidential Palace last October where over 300 wheat growers parked 100 tractors outside the stately grounds.
Meanwhile, olive producers were due to announce their decision on taking protest measures after a meeting last night.
