The anger of farmers continues to rumble across France. On Monday, two agricultural unions, the FNSEA and the Young Farmers, are planning a “siege” of Paris. For his part, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal is this Sunday visiting a farm in Indre-et-Loire, where he notably declared that he was considering “additional” measures against unfair competition. Guest of the Grand Rendez-vous d’Europe 1/ CNews/ The echoes, Jean-Philippe Tanguy, deputy president of the National Rally group in the Assembly and deputy for the Somme, returned to the farmers’ scolding. He points to the responsibility of the European Union whose “treaties organize abrupt, wild competition, the most unfair possible”.
Returning to Gabriel Attal’s various visits to farmers, the RN deputy assures that he “admires the calm of the farmers who listen to the Prime Minister”. According to him, “all that Gabriel Attal describes (in front of the farmers) is Macronism for seven years, before him it was Dutchism with Mr. Macron, Minister of the Economy, and it is the whole of European construction since at least 1992, or even before with the single act in 1986.”
“We don’t need free trade treaties to export excellent products”
For Jean-Philippe Tanguy, the unfair competition that “denounces Gabriel Attal […] is enshrined in the European treaties since it consists of opening up, believing that ‘sweet trade’, as the Macronists say, will improve the world and will put everyone in the world in competition. And so our farmers are in competition with South America, with Vietnam, with all the countries which obviously do not have standards.” Since 2019, a free trade agreement has existed between the European Union and the Mercosur economic alliance, which includes Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay, but has never been ratified.
The deputy president of the RN group in the Assembly also criticizes “unfair competition within the European Community, within the Common Market which should have united the economies together, which should have harmonized them”. For their part, farmers are protesting in particular against competition from Ukraine, with which a trade agreement has been in place since the start of the war.
Targeting “French multinationals” who “confiscate our industry by people who don’t work much but line their pockets”, Jean-Philippe Tanguy concludes that “we don’t need free trade treaties to export products of excellence.