Industrial farming kills bees with pesticides, over-fertilises our fields, and tortures animals in factory farms. And yet, it is subsidised with €59 billion every year from our taxes. [1] What more? This is the biggest part of the EU budget! [2]

Right now, politicians are discussing how to redistribute this money. Will future subsidies go to farmers who feed us healthy food and treat animals humanely? Or will it remain as bad as it is now?

Thousands of us, farmers and consumers, from Malta to Aarhus, from Warsaw to Madrid, will come together next weekend in days of action. We’ll protest, we’ll cook sustainable food for the public, we’ll teach about sustainable farming and we’ll demand a U-turn away from harmful farming practices.

Today we’re launching an open letter, which we will publish in a press release on Friday to open the action days. We need a great big boom for the start: 100,000 signatures, in order to show the media and decision-makers that we, Europeans, care about our food and our farming. Please sign now.

At last, some of the European Ministers of Agriculture are realising the disaster happening before our eyes: insects, pollinators of our plants and nourishment for birds, are vanishing. [3] The German government, for instance, is discussing a program to protect insects. The Ministry for the Environment wants to spend €100 million per year on the program (great!), but the Minister of Agriculture is not in favour of it. [4] €100 million is a lot of money, but it’s a tiny amount compared to €59 billion that industrial farming gets from the EU. Instead of taking decisive action, they are spending their time bickering! This sort of thing is happening all over the EU.

But this arguing also shows we have an opportunity. Some politicians are open to our call for better farming. But others still aren’t listening. That is why we chose a pot and a spoon as symbols for the campaign: We will bang one against another and make enough noise to be heard.

In another three weeks we will repeat our action, this time in Brussels. We will show up in front of the building where EU Ministers of Agriculture will meet to decide about the future of our food. We’ll bring vegetables, pots, pans and cutlery with us. We’ll cook for the politicians, we’ll make noise, and we’ll deliver the demands of European citizens for a U-turn against harmful industrial agriculture.

Agricultural policy is a hotly contested issue because of the massive amounts of money involved. The proposed EU budget for the next seven years provides far too much money for industrial agriculture and far too little money for more sustainable farming and environmental protection. It’s time for governments to put the public interest before the interest of big business.

The past year has shown us that we can prevail against the lobby of the big agricultural industry. Just last year, our community and our partners managed to cut the length of the license for the toxic pesticide glyphosate down to only five years, when EU politicians wanted 15!

Your signature shows that we care about food and farming: We want our daily bread to be healthy, we want our farmers to prosper and we want animals to be treated humanely.

From kitchens and farmlands (and offices) all over Europe,

Mika (Bordeaux), Jörg (Lübeck), Virginia (Madrid), and the rest of us at WeMove.EU

PS: Whenever we eat something, we depend on the agricultural industry. Our food can only be as good as the agricultural model with which it’s produced. For us and for our environment, let’s grow our food in ways that reduce waste, reduce the amount of toxic chemicals, and promote a resilient and diverse food and farming system.

Sign the open letter now.

References:
[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/central-europes-big-farms-cry-foul-over-eu-commission-funding-cuts-phil-hogan/
[2] https://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/sites/agriculture/files/cap-post-2013/graphs/graph1_en.pdf
[3] https://www.truthdig.com/articles/insects-are-vanishing-at-an-alarming-rate-new-study-finds/
[4] https://www.archyworldys.com/ministry-of-the-environment-100-million-against-insect-deaths/ and http://www.taz.de/!5542911/