Rural Coordination wants to “block Paris”, actions everywhere in France… What to expect?

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Objective : “go to Paris” to express their anger. This Monday January 6, 2025, farmers affiliated to the Rural Coordination union (second French agricultural union), are mobilizing to once again denounce the EU-Mercosur trade agreement.

The day before, some tractor convoys set off from different regions of France, such as Lyon (Rhône) or Perray-en-Yvelines (Yvelines). None have yet returned to the capital, which the last vacationers left before the start of the school year on Monday morning.

“The police [nous] prevent movement »

If the tractors “have left” towards Paris, “in the places where they are grouped together, the gendarmes prevent them from moving”, confirmed Christian Convers, secretary general of Rural Coordination, late Sunday evening.

“We are not coming to block Paris, moreover, we have agreed not to return to the capital on Sunday evening, returning from vacation,” he insisted on Sunday to AFP.

We come by tractor to express our concerns, and we need a base where we can regroup. If no base is granted to us by the authorities, this will turn into a confrontation that we do not want.

Gatherings prohibited until Monday 12 p.m.

Christian Convers was himself briefly arrested by the police late in the afternoon in Paris, just as he was arriving – by car – to take part in a symbolic gathering at Place du Brazil, in protest against the recent trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur countries.

Paris police headquarters had banned undeclared gatherings from Sunday 6 p.m. to Monday 12 p.m. in a large perimeter of the center of Paris, including in particular Matignon and the Ministry of Agriculture, “considering the calls to demonstrate on January 5, 2025 launched by an agricultural union with a view to “block the capital”.

The Val-de-Marne prefecture did the same around the Rungis market and on the A6 motorway.

Blockages on the roads

Before converging on Paris, Monday morning, farmers from all over Normandy must notably meet at Heudebouville on the edge of l'A13between Vernon and Rouen, Damien Cornier of Rural Coordination in Normandy told AFP.

Towards Lyon, the Agri Chabanière association, supported by Rural Coordination, announced its presence for blockages on the roads. According to the Rhône prefecture, farmers are likely to mobilize from 5 a.m. “tomorrow to block the A450 / A7 / M7 interchange, in both directions”, relay our journalists fromnews Lyon.

Other gathering places are planned in the north, west and south of the capital. Example in Yvelines, with the suspension of traffic on the RN10 since early this morning, reports our local editorial staff 78actu.

What are farmers asking for?

Farmers, at the call of the unions, are up in arms against the EU-Mercosur agreement, which they accuse of favoring the importation of low-cost products with lower environmental standards than those imposed on them.

“We ask to have the same production standards than other countries, we are asking for reductions in controls on farms and increases in controls in supermarkets where we find products that do not meet our standards,” explained Damien Cornier, who grows cereals and beets in Andelys. (Eure).

The actions of the CR, which give this union media visibility, come on the eve of the launch of the campaign for the elections to the chambers of agriculture. These elections, organized from January 15 to 31, will determine the new balance of power between agricultural unions, among which the FNSEA is ultra-dominant according to the last election of 2019.

With AFP.

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