Polish farmers will block the cargo area at the Rava-Ruska – Khrebenne checkpoint for two days. A complete stop to the movement of trucks leaving Ukraine is expected. The blocking of the border is connected with the beginning of pan-European protests by farmers who oppose the "green course" of the European Union. The protests were organized on the eve of the elections to the European Parliament.

Why did the farmers decide to oppose the "green course", which is about ecology? The task of the EU's "green course" is to help Europe become climate neutral at least by 2050.

The main requirements for farmers as part of the "green course": reduce the use of pesticides by 50%, mineral fertilizers – by 20%, 25% of the area must be used for growing organic products. Of course, not everyone likes this, because it requires abandoning the usual practices and may lead to the loss of part of the profit.

But with proper investments, the products will be safer, and losses can be avoided. Both the EU and the governments supported this transition. In previous years – at least since 2015 – farmers received additional subsidies, which were supposed to give them the opportunity to make a technological transition. In addition to the existing ones. And now, when the deadlines for the implementation of the "green course" (the first – in 2025) are approaching, many farmers do not want to switch to the declared parameters, nor to refuse additional subsidies.

Small farming in the EU has long been no longer about the economy, but about social welfare and subsidies. The transition from latifundia and junkers to small-scale farming was very useful for economic transformations after the Second World War – yes, small and medium-sized farming played a really important role in the economic recovery of France, Germany, and Italy in the 50s.

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But 70-75 years have passed, the economic situation has changed, the structure of the population and its employment has changed even in small towns and villages. Now more and more farmers resemble the "new miners" in Britain in the 70s: the economic feasibility of such farming is questionable, and the social model increasingly resembles a parasite on the economy.

Yes, in the same Poland, a farmer receives subsidies simply for growing anything on the ground. We are talking about amounts from 100 to 200 euros per hectare. When the full-scale invasion began, farmers began to receive compensation "from the consequences of the war" – farmers in Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria were compensated for the increase in prices for fertilizers and fuel, and also, in fact, compensated for the possible negative effects of the removal of tariffs on Ukrainian products. That is, since the beginning of the war, farmers have been compensated for hypothetical losses. And they still protested against Ukrainian products.

These protests are an attempt to preserve the ultra-privileged position of farmers in the EU in general. And conservative Eurosceptic political forces (the same Confederation in Poland) rely on them, which often show solidarity with the PRC and the Russian Federation in their rhetoric.

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