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Netherlands to forcefully shut down 3,000 farms

https://thecountersignal.com/netherlands-to-forcefully-shut-down-3000-farms/ By KEEAN BEXTE To comply with the European Union’s radical climate laws, the Dutch government of World Economic Forum acolyte Mark Rutte will force up to 3,000 farms to shut down for good. Farmers will be made an offer on their farms, which the government claims is “well over” market value. According to nitrogen minister Christianne van der Wal, the government purchase will be compulsory. “There is no better offer coming,” claimed van der Wal. Recent EU nature preservation rules require member states to reduce emissions across sectors of the economy. As one of Europe’s most prominent farming nations, half of the Netherlands’ emissions come from agricultural activity. Rutte has warned that those who refuse to comply could face government force. When the Dutch government announced a nitrogen fertilizer reduction mandate, the country saw nationwide protests from farmers. Former agricultural minister resigned from his position as a result of the movement. The Dutch farmer protests received international attention, with protests popping up in Canada in support of the uprising. Rutte’s government policies have many observers concerned about the direction he is taking the country. Earlier this month, the country’s finance minister Sigrid Kaag proposed a law to allow banks to spy on transactions of citizens which totaled more than €100. Privacy watchdog Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens called the bill an unprecedented “surveillance of the Dutch” people.

Netherlands attempting to SHUT DOWN 11,200 farms to meet climate goals – 1/5 of total number of farms

https://petersweden.substack.com/p/dutch-farmers-11200 By Peter Imanuelsen If you have followed my reporting you probably know about the protests happening in the Netherlands. Tens of thousands of farmers have taken to the streets to protest against new climate goals which will force farmers to shut down their farms. They have set hay bales on fire on motorways and dumped manure and even blocked supermarket distribution centers. Around 1/5 of farms will be forced to shut down! According to calculations done by the Finance ministry, a whopping 11,200 livestock farmers will be forced to shut down by the government to reduce nitrogen emissions in order to meet European environmental rules. Another 17,600 farmers would need to reduce the amount of animals they keep to meet these climate goals. And this is bad. Because there are about 54,000 farms in the Netherlands, meaning that around 1/5 of all farms will be forced to shut down and almost 1/3 of farms forced to scale down and reduce livestock. Meaning that thousands and thousands of farmers will be loosing their livelihoods in order to meet government climate goals. They are literally going to make people loose their livelihoods in order to meet climate goals. That is crazy. Not only that, think about all the food that will be lost as a result of this. We are already facing a food crisis due to sky high fertilizer prices and grain shortages due to the war in Ukraine. We need more food now, not less! The climate change fanatics are trying to bring us back to the middle ages. The state is planning on forcing farmers to sell their farms to the state (buying them out). State sanctioned appropriation of farms and land. Now where have I heard about that kind of thing before…? Oh yes, under Communism. I told you that this is Climate Communism and that The Great Reset is just another word for Global Communism. And it seems like people in the Netherlands are not happy with these government plans, as the political party of the Prime Minister in the Netherlands, VVD, has reached a new all-time low in the polls. If there was an election now, they would lose 13 of their 34 seats in parliament. A whopping 7 out of 10 voters say that they are dissatisfied with the Cabinet of the Prime Minister. Meanwhile the new party called Farmer-Citizen Movement is now polling in second place. Farmers held a meeting with the government on Friday, however some farmers are not satisfied with the results and are talking about more protests, with a farmers group that claims to represent 95% of agriculture pledging the ”toughest demonstrations ever”. So the state is planning on forcing farmers to shut down under the excuse of climate change. Forcing them to sell their farms. Essentially this is a form of seizing the means of production. It is basically Communism. Climate Communism. And we all know how that has gone when the state has seized farms before. Look no further than what happened under Stalin in Ukraine or under Mao in China. It is not all bad news however. I guess we will be getting brand new factories producing bug snacks. Or we might get more of ”sustainable” supermarkets like the one named Picnic in the Netherlands which got €600 million in investments, the majority coming from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation! This supermarket focusing on things like vegan food and delivering food in electric vehicles. And guess what! A millionaire investor at Picnic who has also been the director there, is family with a Dutch Minister who has been involved with these new nitrogen laws. You will eat the bugs and you will be happy. You will own nothing and you will be happy.

The Great Food Reset has begun – Net Zero restrictions on farms designed ‘to squeeze small farmers from the market, allowing them to be bought out by multinational agribusiness giants’

https://unherd.com/2023/03/the-great-food-reset-has-begun/ BY THOMAS FAZI We all lose from the global war on farmers France is in flames. Israel is erupting. America is facing a second January 6. In the Netherlands, however, the political establishment is reeling from an entirely different type of protest — one that, perhaps more than any other raging today, threatens to destabilise the global order. The victory of the Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB) in the recent provincial elections represents an extraordinary result for an anti-establishment party that was formed just over three years ago. But then again, these are not ordinary times. The BBB grew out of the mass demonstrations against the Dutch government’s proposal to cut nitrogen emissions by 50% in the country’s farming sector by 2030 — a target designed to comply with the European Union’s emission-reduction rules. While large farming companies have the means to meet these goals — by using less nitrogen fertiliser and reducing the number of their livestock — smaller, often family-owned farms would be forced to sell or shutter. Indeed, according to a heavily redacted European Commission document, this is precisely the strategy’s goal: “extensifying agriculture, notably through buying out or terminating farms, with the aim of reducing livestock”; this would “first be on a voluntary basis, but mandatory buyout is not excluded if necessary”. It is no surprise, then, that the plans sparked massive protests by farmers, who see it as a direct attack on their livelihoods, or that the BBB’s slogan — “No Farms, No Food” — clearly resonated with voters. But aside from concerns about the impact of the measure on the country’s food security, and on a centuries-old rural way of life integral to Dutch national identity, the rationale behind this drastic measure is also questionable. Agriculture currently accounts for almost half of the country’s output of carbon dioxide, yet the Netherlands is responsible for less than 0.4% of the world’s emissions. No wonder many Dutch fail to see how such negligible returns justify the complete overhaul of the country’s farming sector, which is already considered one of the most sustainable in the world: over the past two decades, water dependence for key crops has been reduced by as much as 90%, and the use of chemical pesticides in greenhouses has been almost completely eliminated. Farmers also point out that the consequences of the nitrogen cut would extend well beyond the Netherlands. The country, after all, is Europe’s largest exporter of meat and the second-largest agricultural exporter in the world, just behind the United States — in other words, the plan would cause food exports to collapse at a time when the world is already facing a food and resource shortage. We already know what this might look like. A similar ban on nitrogen fertiliser was conducted in Sri Lanka last year, with disastrous consequences: it caused an artificial food shortage that plunged nearly two million Sri Lankans into poverty, leading to an uprising that toppled the government. Given the irrational nature of the policy, many protesting farmers believe it can’t simply be blamed on the urbanite “green elites” currently running the Dutch government. They suggest one of the underlying reasons for the move is to squeeze small farmers from the market, allowing them to be bought out by multinational agribusiness giants who recognise the immense value of the country’s land — not only is it highly fertile, but it is also strategically located with easy access to the north Atlantic coast (Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe). They also point out that prime minister Rutte is an Agenda Contributor of the World Economic Forum, which is well known for being corporate-driven, while his finance minister and Minister of Social Affairs and Employment are also tied to the body. The struggle playing out in the Netherlands would seem to be part of a much bigger game that seeks to “reset” the international food system. Similar measures are currently being introduced or considered in several other European countries, including Belgium, Germany, Ireland and Britain (where the Government is encouraging traditional farmers to leave the industry to free up land for new “sustainable” farmers). As the second-largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, after the energy sector, agriculture has naturally ended up in the crosshairs of Net Zero advocates — that is, virtually all major international and global organisations. The solution, we are told, is “sustainable agriculture” — one of the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which form their “Agenda 2030”. This issue has now been pushed to the top of the global agenda. Last November’s G20 meeting in Bali called for “an accelerated transformation towards sustainable and resilient agriculture and food systems and supply chains” to “ensure that food systems better contribute to adaptation and mitigation to climate change”. Just a few days later, in Egypt, the COP27 annual Green Agenda Climate Summit launched its initiative aimed at promoting “a shift towards sustainable, climate-resilient, healthy diets”. Within a year, its Food and Agriculture Organization aims to launch a “roadmap” for reducing greenhouse emissions in the agricultural sector. The endgame is hinted at in several other UN documents: reducing nitrogen use and global livestock production, lowering meat consumption, and promoting more “sustainable” sources of protein, such as plant-based or lab-grown products, and even insects. The United Nations Environment Programme, for example, has stated that global meat and dairy consumption must be reduced by 50% by 2050. Other international and multilateral organisation have presented their own plans for transforming the global food system. The EU’s Farm to Fork strategy “aims to accelerate our transition to a sustainable food system”. Meanwhile, the World Bank, in its climate change action plan for 2021-2025, says that 35% of the bank’s total funding during this period will be devoted to transforming agriculture and other key systems to deal with climate change. Alongside these intergovernmental and multilateral bodies, a vast network of “stakeholders” is now devoted to the “greening” of agriculture and food production — private foundations, public-private partnerships, NGOs and corporations. Reset the Table, a 2020 Rockefeller Foundation report, called for moving away from a “focus on maximising shareholder returns” to “a more equitable system focused on fair returns and benefits to all stakeholders”. This may sound like a good idea, until one considers that “stakeholder capitalism” is a concept heavily promoted by the World Economic Forum, which represents the interests of the largest and most powerful corporations on the planet. The Rockefeller Foundation has very close ties to the WEF, which is itself encouraging farmers to embrace “climate-smart” methods in order to make the “transition to net-zero, nature-positive food systems by 2030”. The WEF is also a big believer in the need to drastically reduce cattle farming and meat consumption and switch to “alternative proteins”. Arguably the most influential public-private organisation specifically “dedicated to transforming our global food system” is the EAT-Lancet Commission, which is largely modelled around the Davos “multistakeholderist” approach. This is based on the premise that global policymaking should be shaped by a wide range of unelected “stakeholders”, such as academic institutions and multinational corporations, working hand-in-glove with governments. This network, cofounded by the Wellcome Trust, consists of UN agencies, world-leading universities, and corporations such as Google and Nestlé. EAT’s founder and president, Gunhild Stordalen, a Norwegian philanthropist who is married to one of the country’s richest men, has described her intention to organise a “Davos for food”. EAT’s work was initially supported by the World Health Organization, but in 2019 the WHO withdrew its endorsement after Gian Lorenzo Cornado, Italy’s ambassador and permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, questioned the scientific basis for the dietary regime being pushed by EAT — which is focused on promoting plant-based foods and excluding meat and other animal-based foods. Cornado argued that “a standard diet for the whole planet” that ignores age, sex, health and eating habits “has no scientific justification at all” and “would mean the destruction of millenary healthy traditional diets which are a full part of the cultural heritage and social harmony in many nations”. Perhaps more important, said Cornado, is the fact that the dietary regime advised by the commission “is also nutritionally deficient and therefore dangerous to human health” and “would certainly lead to economic depression, especially in developing countries”. He also raised concerns that “the total or nearly total elimination of foods of animal origin” would destroy cattle farming and many other activities related to the production of meat and dairy products. Despite these concerns, raised by a leading member of the world’s top public health body and shared by a network representing 200 million small-scale farmers in 81 countries, EAT continues to play a central role in the global push for the radical transformation of food systems. At the 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit, which originated from a partnership between the WEF and the UN Secretary-General, Stordalen was given a leading role. SUGGESTED READING George Monbiot’s farming fantasies BY JOHN-LEWIS STEMPEL This complete blurring of the boundaries between the public and the private-corporate spheres in the agricultural and food sectors is also happening in other areas — with Bill Gates standing somewhere in the middle. Alongside healthcare, agriculture is the main focus of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which finances several initiatives whose stated aim is to increase food security and promote sustainable farming, such as Gates Ag One, CGIAR and the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa. Civil society organisations, however, have accused the Foundation of using its influence to promote multinational corporate interests in the Global South and to push for ineffective (but very profitable) high-tech solutions which have largely failed to increase global food production. Nor are Gates’s “sustainable” agricultural activities limited to developing countries. As well as investing in plant-based protein companies, such as Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods, Gates has been buying huge amounts of farmland in the US, to the point of becoming the biggest private owner of farmland in the country. The problem with the globalist trend he embodies is obvious: ultimately, small and medium-scale farming is more sustainable than large-scale industrial farming, as it is typically associated with greater biodiversity and the protection of landscape features. Small farms also provide a whole range of other public goods: they help to maintain lively rural and remote areas, preserve regional identities, and offer employment in regions with fewer job opportunities. But most importantly, small farms feed the world. A 2017 study found that the “peasant food web” — the diverse network of small-scale producers disconnected from Big Agriculture — feeds more than half of the world’s population using only 25% of the world’s agricultural resources. Traditional farming, though, is suffering an unprecedented attack. Small and medium-scale farmers are being subjected to social and economic conditions in which they simply cannot survive. Peasant farms are disappearing at an alarming rate across Europe and other regions, to the benefit of the world’s food oligarchs — and all this is being done in the name of sustainability. At a time when almost a billion people around the world are still affected by hunger, the lesson of the Dutch farmers could not be more urgent, or inspiring. For now, at least, there is still time to resist the Great Food Reset.

Germany cutting back meat production to fight ‘global warming’ – To reduce all livestock on German farms by 50%

https://hotair.com/jazz-shaw/2022/11/21/germany-cutting-back-meat-production-to-fight-global-warming-n512518 By JAZZ SHAW Germany is still caught up in the demands of the climate change lobby to reduce its carbon footprint drastically in the coming years. One part of this initiative, similar to calls we’ve seen from activists in the United States, was a mandate to reduce all livestock on German farms by 50%. Farmers have been protesting the decision in the same way they recently did in the Netherlands this summer, but the initiative is moving forward beginning this year. Now, to the great surprise of nobody who has been paying attention, the German Meat Industry Association has reported that the country will be facing a severe meat shortage by the time spring arrives and consumers should expect prices to skyrocket, potentially doubling in some cases. It would appear that some people in the German government have never heard of something called the law of supply and demand. But at least they’re going to defeat global warming, right? (Financial Trends) Die Welt, citing the German Meat Industry Association (VDF), reported this week that within the next four to six months Germany will face a meat shortage, and prices will skyrocket. Hubert Kelliger, a VDF board member and head of group sales at meat seller Westfleisch said, “In four, five, six months we will have gaps on the shelves.” Pork is expected to experience the worst shortages. The issues in meat supply are due to Berlin insisting on reducing the numbers of livestock by 50% to reduce global warming emissions. Experts are warning this policy will result in mass shutdown of meat-producing companies, and that will produce a 40% rise in the price of meat. Shooting that large of a hole in the supply chain is projected to produce a cascade of negative effects. The anticipated shift will result in more than just the price of pork and beef going through the roof. German markets will have to rely more heavily on imported meat, driving costs up further while improving the economies of their neighbors that continue with normal ranching. But on top of that, the domestic supply of natural fertilizer will be cut in half. This is projected to lead to reductions in the volume of vegetables that will be produced. The lack of natural fertilizers (i.e. manure) will force farmers to switch to more expensive artificial fertilizers. As a bonus to all of this badness and madness, the artificial fertilizers require the use of large amounts of ammonia (which is converted to urea), and all of that ammonia is produced via a process that requires the burning of significant amounts of natural gas, thereby negating much of the carbon reduction goals that are driving this decision. So to sum all of this up, in its efforts to reduce its carbon footprint, Germany will bankrupt many of its farmers, have less meat available for consumers who will be paying nearly twice as much for it, and they’ll significantly increase the amount of fossil fuels they burn. And all of this will be happening at a time when German consumers are already struggling with high rates of inflation and rising prices. Also, they will be much more dependent on imports from other countries, so any disruptions in the supply chain will hit them all the harder. Didn’t the Germans notice what happened when they tried to shut down fossil fuels and their nuclear power plants? Some of them had the nerve to seem surprised when they were forced to begin turning out the lights and warnings were issued about people potentially freezing to death this winter. I find it difficult to have too much sympathy for Germany at this point. The war in Ukraine and the resultant rejection of Russian oil and gas has certainly produced undesirable results in that country. But these climate initiatives are only adding to their misery on top of the anticipated shortages. How many self-inflicted wounds are German voters willing to put up with before they start voting all of the climate crazies out of office?

Dutch Farmers mass protest with tractors against regulations that will reduce farms and food

https://joannenova.com.au/2022/07/dutch-farmers-mass-protest-with-tractors-against-regulations-that-will-reduce-farms-and-food/ By Jo Nova Don’t wait for your government Newspeak channel to tell you On Twitter #Netherlands, massive protests are underway. Farmers have been told to shut farms to reduce nitrogen emissions and they’ve taken to the streets. (It’s not clear if this is purely about fertilizer runoff, or climate change as well.) The word is that supermarket shelves are emptying fast, roads are blocked, but that 75% of the public generally support the farmers and are joining in on foot in some places. Farmers are dumping hay bales in the streets and spraying manure on government offices. There are claims (with footage) that the Dutch government has brought in armored vehicles and is using tear gas. Some video allegedly shows masked police zero in on single peaceful protestors and pull them out. Express.UK Now ANOTHER crisis hits EU! Hundreds of tractors block the German/Netherlands border FARMERS in the Netherlands have staged a huge protest with thousands of tractors lining up to block the German/Netherlands border in campaign against the government’s controversial nitrogen policy. Protestors demonstrated in front of several public buildings with manure and slurry after politicians voted on proposals to slash emissions of damaging pollutants, a plan which could force farmers to cut their livestock herds or stop working altogether. Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s Government says the emissions of nitrogen oxide and ammonia, which livestock produce, must be drastically cut back close to nature areas, which are part of a network of protected habitats for endangered plants and wildlife stretching across the EU. Dutch farmers turned out in their thousands to speak out against the World Economic Forum (WEF) climate change policies of their government.   Dutch Netherlands Farmers Protest Flat White, The Spectator How the ‘green’ EU starves the world There’s a food crisis brewing, but you wouldn’t know it with the way the European bureaucracy is behaving. Dutch farmers – who sit as the second-largest agricultural exporter in the world and largest meat exporter in Europe – have brought the Netherlands to a standstill, protesting against Climate Change regulations. The newly elected government has set up a 55-60 per cent emissions goal by 2030, 70 per cent by 2035, and 80 per cent at 2040. To meet these arbitrary climate targets, they have created a self-inflicted disaster that will see the government drag its agricultural sector up the temple stairs, tear it to bits, and let whatever bloody stumps are left to tumble down the steps for the pleasure of the United Nations climate gods. Farms which have been feeding the world for hundreds of years are going to be unceremoniously shut and their owners ruined because a couple of bureaucrats decided they didn’t like the nitrogen and ammonia emissions produced by growing food. The press have attempted to demonise farmers for defying the EU’s virtuous green push – but the Dutch people aren’t listening, with support for farmers still over 75 per cent. ….             h/t Tonyb, another Ian. 10 out of 10 based on 94 ratings

Protesting The Non-Crisis Nitrogen ‘Crisis’ In The Netherlands

  https://www.wmbriggs.com/post/39242/ By William M. Briggs On the Fourth of July, a group of angry Dutch farmers and fishermen, presumably dressed as colorful Frisians, and in the grip of angry exuberance, burnt bales of hay on roads, and blocked up highways with tractors and farm equipment, shutting down traffic throughout the country. Ports and borders were stopped up. As fun as that was, it doesn’t beat this:   This was all in protest of the government’s declaration that nitrogen is a “crisis“, and so threatening to confiscate farms to “solve” the “crisis.” Prediction: Later, it will be said to be a coincidence when the government eventually disposes of the confiscated farms by selling them to rich people. What makes it all funny is that—sit down for this—there is no nitrogen “crisis” in the Netherlands. “Briggs, how do you know there is no nitrogen crisis in the Netherlands, when Experts there have declared that one exists?” Thank you for that question. Here’s how. 1. Nitrogen Critical Loads: Critical Reflections on Past Experiments, Ecological Endpoints, and Uncertainties, a peer-reviewed review paper by (chemist) Jaap Hanekamp and Yours Truly. Abstract: Nitrogen Critical Loads (NCL), as purported ecological dose-response outcomes for nitrogen deposition from anthropogenic sources, play a central role in environmental policies around the world. In the Netherlands, these NCL are used to assess, via calculations using the model AERIUS, to what extent NCL are exceeded for different habitats as a result of different sources such as industry, agriculture, traffic. NCL are, however, not well defined, and are subject to hitherto unrecognized forms of uncertainty. We will address this with reference to a number of key studies that forms the basis for several NCL. We will subsequently propose amendments that could be applicable to future nitrogen studies and their enhanced relevancy in decision making. Nitrogen “critical” loads are one of the key metrics the government and Experts use to declare a “crisis.” Here’s a an executive summary letter on that paper (same journal; full pdf). And here’s a popular article on that paper. 2. The model AERIUS/OPS model, mentioned above, and another metric use to declare a “crisis”, is not good. Here’s one representative picture from a new paper we are working on which assess that model (the picture is not ours, but from an experiment to test the model): Y-axis are predictions of SF6, and the X-axis are the observations, at some distance from a power plant. That look like a good prediction to you? To me neither. 3. National land grabbing or the anti-politics of nitrogen policy. (This is from Hanekamp’s blog, written in an obscure language that no one of my acquaintance will admit to knowing, so what you see is a machine translation.) As part of the “crisis”, areas designated as “sensitive” to nitrogen must be protected by being surrounded by naturea areas. “A tiny sliver of 3.84 hectares near the Frisian coast, H7140A (vibrated peat), has been designated as nitrogen-sensitive…Despite the small surface area of this habitat, a protection strip of no less than 28,000 hectares in total is deemed necessary by ministers” to form this protection zone. Would you call this overkill? Or even overdreven? So would I. 4. Another (brief) review paper by the same Definitive Duo: Outlining A New Method To Quantify Uncertainty In Nitrogen Critical Loads. Abstract: We highlight deficiencies and improvements of a nitrogen critical load model. An original model using logistic regression augmented observations with fictitious data. We replace that with actual data, and show how to incorporate uncertainty in nitrogen measurement into the modeling process. In the end, however, we show a basic logistic regression model has irremovable deficiencies, giving positive probability of harmful effects of nitrogen even when no nitrogen is present. That last line is amazing, ain’t it? 5. Another peer-reviewed beauty: A volatile discourse – reviewing aspects of ammonia emissions, models and atmospheric concentrations in The Netherlands. (Journal link.) From the Abstract: In the Netherlands, there is a vigorous debate on ammonia emissions…We show that uncertainty in published results is substantial. This uncertainty is under- or even unreported, and as a result, data in national emission inventories are overconfident by a wide margin. Next, we demonstrate that the statistical handling of data on atmospheric ammonia concentrations to produce national yearly atmospheric averages is oversimplified and consequently atmospheric concentrations are substantially overestimated. Finally, we show that the much-discussed ‘ammonia gap’ – either the discrepancy between calculated and measured atmospheric ammonia concentrations or the difference observed between estimated NH3 emission levels and those indicated by atmospheric measurements – is an expression of the widespread overconfidence placed in atmospheric modelling. Over-certainty abounds. And is embraced by people who love to yell “Crisis!” 6. Another paper: Uncertainty in the MAN Data Calibration & Trend Estimates. Abstract quote: “We investigate trend identification in the LML and MAN atmospheric ammonia data. The signals are mixed in the LML data, with just as many positive, negative, and no trends found. The start date for trend identification is crucial, with the trends claimed changing sign and significance depending on the start date.” These stations measure ammonia (one of the forms of nitrogen in the “crisis”) in the Netherlands. 7+ Response to van Pul, van Zanten and Wichink Kruit, and Comment on Goedhart and Huijsmans (2017) That’s enough, but we have others, and more to come, too. Soon. Buy my new book and learn to argue against the regime: Everything You Believe Is Wrong.

Watch: Morano on Rebel TV: ‘Farmers aren’t taking it anymore’ – Update on EU farmers’ protest

Rebel TV – The Ezra Levant Show – Broadcast Feb 29, 2024  ‘Farmers aren’t taking it anymore’: Climate Depot founder gives update on EU farmers’ protest ‘Europeans probably wake up every day and thank God that Justin Trudeau isn’t their leader, because right now they would be declared domestic terrorists under a first-ever invoked Emergencies Act in Europe,’ stated Marc Morano. On The Ezra Levant Show, Ezra asked Marc Morano, Founder of Climate Depot, to explain what’s going on in Europe, as we’ve been seeing images of farmers protesting in creative ways, such as dumping manure on politicians’ buildings. Additionally, he requested an update on the farmers in Belgium, since it reminds him of the vibes from the Canadian truckers. “Europeans probably wake up every day and thank God that Justin Trudeau isn’t their leader, because right now they would be declared ‘domestic terrorists’ under a first-ever invoked emergencies act in Europe,” Morano replied.  “They would be facing not having access to their own money, having their insurance cancelled. So the good news is Justin Trudeau’s not there to crack down on them. That’s the first point I wanted to make.” Morano added that what’s happening in Europe right now with this farmer rebellion is what he “wished had happened back in March and April of 2020” with the general public standing against the public health tyranny that was COVID, lockdowns, stay-at-home orders, social distancing, and the cancellation of weddings and funerals. “The farmers aren’t taking it anymore. And what they’re not taking is the net-zero agenda that was born out of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. And then, of course, moving forward all the way to the UN Paris Agreement,” he added. In many countries, politicians agree to UN climate summits, but then these agreements become law at home, forcing farmers to reduce emissions, Morano explained. He also emphasised that these are “climate compliance costs, meaning small family-run generational farms can’t afford the cost to absorb all of these costs and new ways and new technology that’s supposed to capture the nitrogen. And what ends up happening is they’re facing extinction.” He continued: The big boys come in—the billionaires, the equity assets, the big agribusiness corporations—which is exactly what the forces of the United Nations/World Economic Forum want because they can control them. And this is what happened in the Netherlands. They were facing 10,000 small to medium family-run farms, which had been operating for generations, being shut down. The farmers in the Netherlands fought back, and I think the farmers in the rest of Europe watched what happened. The farmers in the Netherlands formed their own political party, the BBB. They’re now a governing coalition and they’re stopping the net-zero madness. So in Belgium, France, Poland, Spain, Sweden, and at the headquarters of the EU in Brussels, they are letting it be known that they are not going to allow the net-zero agenda to shut them down. And they’re trying to move nitrogen down the same pedestal as they put CO2. WATCH: 'Farmers aren't taking it anymore': Climate Depot founder gives update on EU farmers' protest "Europeans probably wake up every day and thank God that Justin Trudeau isn't their leader,' says Marc Morano (@ClimateDepot). MORE: https://t.co/8CaeoM5w6o. — Rebel News Canada (@RebelNews_CA) March 1, 2024

Watch: Morano on Canadian’s Rebel TV on how Net-Zero ideology & big government-corporate collusion are rationing our lives: ‘It’s happening in transportation, it’s happening in food, and of course, it’s happening in energy.’

https://www.rebelnews.com/the_dutch_farmers_protests_made_for_an_anti_net_zero_success_story_but_theres_more_to_be_done The Dutch farmers’ protests made for an anti-net-zero success story— but there’s more to be done Marc Morano explained that the purpose of net-zero ideology is to create big government-corporate collusion: ‘It’s happening in transportation, it’s happening in food, and of course, it’s happening in energy.’ On last night’s episode of The Ezra Levant Show, guest host Sheila Gunn Reid spoke with Marc Morano, publisher of ClimateDepot.com about the success of the farmers’ protest after the EU removed ‘green regulations’ that sparked civil unrest. Marc told Sheila about the net-zero agenda, and what happened in the Netherlands when the government tried to force it on the people: Just overall, net zero means the intentional collapse or severe restriction of energy, food, transportation, and freedom of movement. In the case of food, they’re looking for severe rationing of food. They’re going after nitrogen-based fertilizer which they say creates nitrous oxide, which is a warming agent. So that means cutting back on fertilizer means cutting back on high-yield agriculture, which in short means cutting back on plentiful food, which has been part of the Green Revolution that’s fed billions throughout the world, particularly since the 1960s. So in the case of the Netherlands, they were facing up to 10,000 family-run small and medium farms being decimated by the quote climate compliance costs of net zero, and the farmers didn’t take it. They brought the tractors out, they blocked highways, they went to the country’s capital and they went beyond that. They formed their own political party, the BBB, and they are part of a governing coalition now in the Netherlands stopping this. This has inspired and this is the success story of the year of the climate movement right now. Sheila responded: Like there’s just so much of the environment movement that is disgusting from what they want me to eat, to what they want me to do with my toenail clippings. Like, it is gross. And I’m a farmer, but more than being a farmer, I’m also a conservationist. I’m the sixth generation on the land where I live. I have a real tough time taking advice from people who don’t ever get off the pavement telling me that they know what’s best for my land. Marc explained the true goals of the net-zero agenda and why big corporations are backing it: They want this because they want to control the food supply when you get rid of all these small farmers, what’s gonna happen to them? Either they become strip malls or you’re going to have the big conglomerates, equity asset firms, the big corporations coming in and taking over. We had this happen with the US fracking during lockdowns with a huge drop in demand. We had a lot of smaller companies and landowners releasing and then you have instantly the big guys come in. This is why Exxon Mobil has always supported carbon taxes, has always supported UN Paris climate agreements with the UN because they can afford the climate compliance costs and they have the best lawyers and lobbyists. And so this is kind of like the COVID lockdowns [goal] to crush all the small businesses and the mom and pop and the small operators and consolidate to a huge corporate conglomerate that’s easy to control, and you can have great corporate-government collusion. It’s happening in transportation, it’s happening in food, and of course, it’s happening in energy.

Farmers win: Major EU backdown on farming emissions and regulations

Farmers win: Major EU backdown on farming emissions and regulations By Jo Nova Farmers win the day after mass protests Thousands of farmers in tractors and trucks protested in the Netherlands, Germany, France, Ireland, Sweden, Portugul, Greece and Spain. Farmers in Poland are planning to block the Ukrainian border. The French farmers held Paris under siege, blocking roads, pouring manure everywhere and leaving supermarket shelves empty, then after they won some concessions from President Macron, they kept on driving to Brussels and did it all again with help from farmers from other countries. The EU is the target. The thing that made this so potent was not just that the farmers had heavy equipment that moved obstacles and drove over barriers, they also had huge public support. Something like 80 to 90% of French citizens supported the farmers and were willing to put up with the inconvenience. Then to cap it off, EU elections are coming in June, and they only happen once every five years. The Greens look like they will do badly.  That people like Geert Wilders can win in national elections must have shocked the politerati class. But right wing governments have been elected in Italy, Sweden, and Finland too. This looks like a major win. Not only is the EU backing down on the demands to cut nitrogen and methane by a third, but they’re also not going to halve the use of pesticides, and they’re not even going to harass EU citizens smugly telling them to eat less meat. The next big move of climate activists was through agriculture, but this has, for the moment, hit the fan… EU drops net zero demands after farmers’ protests The Telegraph The European Union has caved in to angry protests from farmers and cut a target to slash agricultural emissions as part of the bloc’s net zero drive. A demand to reduce nitrogen, methane and other emissions linked to farming by almost a third has been removed from a wider Brussels plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 90 per cent by 2040. The move to offer concessions to the farmers would be seen as a major step away from the bloc’s original green plans. People may have missed just how big the European farmer protests have been. For some reason the media didn’t want to cover what happens when farmers get angry. Like the truck-driver protests in Canada last year, these sort of revolts are potentially dangerous to the political class. They can bring a nation to its knees in days. Journalists and media moguls scorn the workers, but they quietly fear their power. If the masses wake up and realize they don’t have to put up with rules set by chattering classes and desk jocks, that could wreck the cushy lifestyles of the wordsmiths and academics. A truckload of manure can stop the traffic… Such was the anger, there were fires in the carpark of the EU Parliament, and fires on French highways.   …     Reuters: At least 14 highways in the regions of Catalonia, Andalusia, Castille-La Mancha and Valencia were blockaded, official traffic data showed. Victor Orban PM of Hungary explains that the EU rules destroy farming in Europe by imposing rules on European farmers but then allowing produce from other parts of the world to come in which have none of these rules. The push to reduce pesticides and force organic farming onto European farms, but not on imports was one of the major complaints about EU regulations.   Nigel Farage explains the importance a week ago:         The war is far from over. After the elections, if there is any way they can, the EU still wants to bring in absurd laws of climate voodoo and witchcraft. Green backlash looms over EU elections [Reuters] The European Commission is set to recommend an ambitious goal to cut net greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by 2040. The target would aim to foster green jobs and low-carbon industries, drafts of the proposal showed. Polls show more seats could go to far-right and right-leaning parties opposed to climate policies. EU officials say backing for ambitious green laws has also been eroded among EU states by recent elections in Finland, Sweden, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. Photos came from these Twitter links: RadioGenoa: Burning at Brussels RadioGenoa: French Farmers moving road barricades at night. Golden Angel tractor queue in Berlin Manure pouring into in a police station Manure pouring French farmers throwing tyres on a fire French farmers dig up ashpalt. French Tractors drove wherever they wanted to. Thank you Elon.

Cheers! Net Zero Rollback in full swing! ‘EU to delay new green rule…EU’s looming green election backlash…Labour to ditch annual green investment pledge’

https://mailchi.mp/a9c5a4e027e3/net-zero-rollback-in-full-swing-200752?e=0b1369f9f8 Net Zero Samizdat    The world’s best climate & energy policy bulletin 2 February 2024   1) Labour to ditch £28bn annual green investment pledge, party sources say The Guardian, 1 February 2024 2) EU to delay new green rule in bid to appease protesting farmers The Guardian, 31 January 2024 3) Europe’s solar panel manufacturers ask EU for emergency support Reuters, 30 January 2024 4) EU’s looming green election backlash – here’s what to expect EurActiv, 31 January 2024 5) Volvo pulls the plug on its electric car brand The Daily Telegraph, 2 February 2024 6) UK Regulator probes wind power overstatement Bloomberg, 1 February 2024 7) Fraser Myers: Europe’s farmers are right to rise up against our eco-obsessed elites Spiked, 30 January 2024 8) Terence Corcoran: Inside the litigious world of climate hockey sticks Financial Post, 1 February 2024 9) Matthew Lynn: Ignore the French: Net Zero is destroying British industry, not Brexit The Daily Telegraph, 31 January 2024 10) You couldn’t make it up! German Greens push to water down EU party’s climate targets EurActiv, 31 January 2024 1) Labour to ditch £28bn annual green investment pledge, party sources say The Guardian, 1 February 2024 Keir Starmer and Rachel Reevs are ditching Labour’s flagship policy pledge to spend £28bn a year on green investment, party sources have said. The sources said the party would keep the core mission of investing in green infrastructure, as well as already announced plans such as the creation of GB Energy, a publicly owned clean energy company, and a mass home insulation programme. But it will in effect cut its green ambitions by about two-thirds, given that the previously announced schemes are set to cost just under £10bn a year by the end of the parliament. The change, after a spate of recent government attacks portraying the £28bn figure as a likely tax rise, has been pushed for by key figures around Starmer including Morgan McSweeney, Labour’s director of campaigns, and Pat McFadden, the party’s campaigns coordinator. In a series of media interviews after speeches by Reeves and Starmer to a conference in London attended by hundreds of business executives, the shadow chancellor was repeatedly asked about the £28bn figure and declined each time to back it. Asked 10 times during an interview with Sky News, Reeves said of the plan: “I think what people need to know is that the fiscal rules are the most important thing for me … I know the importance of economic and fiscal stability and that will always come first.” One shadow minister said: “The £28bn is definitely going as a figure. It will be changed to specific outcomes linked to specific investment, rather than being a random figure to be allocated at a later date.” In a sign of how Starmer is likely to frame the decision, the source added: “It was always meant to be formally allocated before the general election, so this isn’t such a major departure really. It’s being firmed up, not dropped.” While scaling back the green prosperity plan has been under consideration for some weeks, dropping the £28bn annual target, unveiled with great fanfare by Reeves at the Labour conference in 2021, would be politically risky for Starmer and his team. Full story 2) EU to delay new green rule in bid to appease protesting farmers The Guardian, 31 January 2024 Farmers protesting across Europe have won their first concession from Brussels, with the EU announcing a delay in rules that would have forced them to set aside land to encourage biodiversity and soil health. About 10,000 French farmers stepped up their protests on Wednesday, with at least 100 blockades on major roads across France, as 18 farmers were arrested for blocking traffic as they tried to reach the wholesale food market at Rungis, south-east of Paris and 79 others were detained after they managed to get inside. Belgian farmers joined protests at the French border and others blocked access roads to the Zeebrugge container port for a second day. Spanish and Italian farmers also demonstrated. The European Commission vice-president, Maroš Šefčovič, described Wednesday’s decision to delay rules on setting aside land, which is expected to be rubber-stamped by member states within 15 days, as “a helping hand” for the sector at a difficult time. Citing flooding, wildfires in Greece, heatwaves across southern Europe and drought in Spain which has left reservoirs in Andalucia at 20% normal levels, he said it was important to listen to farmers and “to avoid the polarisation which is making any good conversation and discussion more difficult. “We feel we are obliged to act under this pressure which the farming community [is feeling],” he said. “We have had a number of extreme meteorological events, droughts, flooding in various parts of Europe, and there was a clear negative effect on the output, on the revenue – and of course, decreased income – for the farmers.” Combined with higher energy prices, the weather-related risks to crops meant farmers were at a “persistent pain point” that was “driving up the cost of production and squeezing revenues”, Šefčovič said. Full story 3) Europe’s solar panel manufacturers ask EU for emergency support Reuters, 30 January 2024 BRUSSELS, Jan 30 (Reuters) – Europe’s solar panel manufacturing industry has urged the European Union to step in with emergency measures to avoid local firms shutting down under price pressure from Chinese imports, a letter seen by Reuters showed. Multiple European solar manufacturers have announced plans to close factories in recent months, citing pressure from a flood of imports and an oversupply of solar panel parts that have piled up in European warehouses and pushed down prices. In a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, industry group the European Solar Manufacturing Council (ESMC) warned that without rapid help, the EU risked losing more than half of its operational solar photovoltaic module manufacturing capacity within weeks. “Over the next 4–8 weeks, major EU PV module producers and their European suppliers are poised to shut down manufacturing lines unless substantial emergency measures are promptly implemented,” said the letter, dated Jan. 30. Full story 4) EU’s looming green election backlash – here’s what to expect EurActiv, 31 January 2024 Over the past weeks, several European political parties have circulated draft versions of their manifestos for the upcoming EU elections between 6-9 June. Euractiv walks you through the potential implications for energy and environment policy. In short, all signs point to a right-wing turn after the Green Wave of the last EU election in 2019. EPP: Economy first, environment last. Most significant is the draft manifesto of the European People’s Party (EPP), which brings together centre-right and conservative parties from across Europe. Latest opinion polls show the EPP will keep their top spot in the European Parliament after the elections – albeit by a smaller margin, with 23.5% of the votes and 178 seats, down from 182 currently – making them the biggest group in the EU assembly and the most likely to choose the next European Commission president. So, what’s their programme? The EPP’s draft manifesto, obtained by Euractiv, is marked by the near absence of environmental policy. The word appears only four times in the 14-page document, and when it does, it is framed in the context of Europe’s economic rivalry with competitors like China and the US. “Economic prosperity, ambitious environmental protection and social peace can only succeed in Europe if our economy is also successful worldwide. This is why competitiveness is so crucial,” the EPP manifesto says. Max Griera has the story. Full post 5) Volvo pulls the plug on its electric car brand The Daily Telegraph, 2 February 2024 Polestar remains stuck in the red as battery-powered vehicles lose their illustrious shine To hear him speak, you would think Volvo Cars’ Scottish chief executive Jim Rowan is very much an electric vehicle crusader. Standing beside the company’s new EX30 as he unveiled the Swedish carmaker’s full-year results on Thursday, Rowan said Volvo was leading “a paradigm shift for us and for our entire industry”, boasting that only Tesla had stronger profit margins on sales of electric cars. But that enthusiasm apparently no longer extends to Polestar, Volvo’s dedicated electric marque. On Thursday, Volvo said it would no longer provide financial support to Polestar and would look at offloading some of its 48pc stake in the company to other shareholders, including China’s Geely. (Most of the rest of Polestar is already owned by Geely chairman Eric Li.) The news is the latest blow to Polestar, an early mover in electric cars that has struggled to keep up with premium rivals such as Tesla and which remains heavily loss-making despite its cars receiving critical acclaim. It is also the latest rupture in the electric vehicle industry. Battery-powered cars were once predicted to dominate the vehicle market by the end of this decade, but their sense of inevitability has faded in recent months as sales slow and as targets have been pushed back. Electric vehicle (EV) sales are expected to decline for the first time in seven years in 2024 in Germany, Europe’s biggest car market, and Renault earlier this week scrapped plans to spin-off its EV unit, Ampere, blaming a lack of strong interest from investors and a slowdown in sales. Full story 6) UK Regulator probes wind power overstatement Bloomberg, 1 February 2024 The probe followed a report that many wind farms have saddled consumers with millions in extra costs by overestimating the energy they planned to generate.  The UK energy regulator Ofgem is investigating the behavior of wind farms that have been overstating how much power they will produce. The probe follows a Bloomberg News report earlier Thursday which found that dozens of wind farms, many run by some of Europe’s largest energy companies, have saddled consumers with millions in extra costs by routinely overestimating the energy they planned to generate. “Ofgem’s wholesale markets oversight team are investigating the alleged behavior,” a spokesman said in an emailed statement, adding that the regulator had also asked National Grid Plc’s network operator to look into the matter. “We will continue to work to protect market integrity and consumers.” The UK’s outdated grid often can’t handle all the electricity that wind farms produce. When that happens, the system operator often pays operators to switch their turbines off. Payments for this “curtailment” are based on what wind farms predict they will generate — and some operators exaggerate their forecasts, which boosts what they receive, according to nine traders, academics and market experts. Bloomberg analyzed 30 million records from 2018 through June 2023 to compare wind operators’ daily forecasts of the energy they planned to generate to their actual production when they weren’t curtailed. Out of 121 wind farms in the analysis, 40 overstated their output by 10% or more on average, and 27 of those overestimated by at least 20%. Read more: Wind Farms Overstate Their Output — And Consumers Pay For It 7) Fraser Myers: Europe’s farmers are right to rise up against our eco-obsessed elites Spiked, 30 January 2024 A ‘siege of Paris’ is underway. Since Monday, thousands of tractors, trailers and combine harvesters have encircled the French capital, blocking key motorways in and out of the city. Roads around Lyon, Limoges and Toulouse have also been brought to a standstill by furious farmers. French farmers have joined the Europe-wide fightback against the green agenda. In the Netherlands, farmers have been revolting for several years against their governments’ stringent restrictions on nitrogen emissions. A policy which, according to the Dutch government’s own figures, could lead to the closure of around 3,000 farms. In Ireland, farmers have risen up over green proposals to cull over 200,000 cows. In Germany, thousands of tractors descended on Berlin earlier this month, protesting against cuts to farm subsidies, tax hikes on diesel fuel and a raft of green rules that have made farmers’ lives intolerable. Certainly, farmers in each of these countries have their own specific grievances. Every European government has proposed its own intrusive regulations or onerous tax hikes. But these are overwhelmingly driven by a common goal: to turn agriculture into a ‘Net Zero’ industry. And for EU member states, this lofty green goal is not a choice – it is a requirement of the EU’s so-called Green Deal. These protests have quickly forced governments to sit up and listen. After just one day of the siege of Paris, the French government offered an array of concessions to the farming sector. New prime minister Gabriel Attal has abandoned a planned hike in diesel-fuel taxes for agricultural vehicles and has pledged millions of euros in grants for organic farms. He has promised to cut some red tape. And he has threatened to fine supermarkets that fail to offer producers a fair price for their wares. But none of this has been enough. Because as every farmer now knows, no amount of subsidies or tax breaks can disguise the coming catastrophe of Net Zero. A demented goal that no government seems prepared to abandon. The root of many of the most damaging climate measures is the EU’s Farm to Fork Strategy, which is itself a key plank of the EU Green Deal. It calls for 10 per cent of agricultural land to be set aside for non-farming use. It says that at least 25 per cent of EU farms should be organic. It demands a 20 per cent reduction in fertiliser use. And it insists that the use of pesticides must fall by 50 per cent. All by 2030. The severity of these measures is hard to overstate. They will drastically cut the amount of food farmers can produce. They will render many farms unviable. But rather than challenge these impossibly stringent rules, most national governments have supplemented them with their own green regulations. ‘[The Green Deal] is a totally disconnected project’, Thierry Coué, deputy general secretary of the FNSEA farmers union and a pig breeder from Brittany, tells Le Figaro. It is an imposition from distant, out-of-touch Eurocrats, laying waste to a sector they do not understand. It seems that Europe’s elites – whether in Brussels, Paris or Berlin – are too wedded to green ideology to see the damage they are doing. Full post 8) Terence Corcoran: Inside the litigious world of climate hockey sticks Financial Post, 1 February 2024 From libel court to climate science to Milei economics While Donald Trump’s embarrassing and costly defamation quagmire received all the headlines last week, a more significant libel trial was grinding on in another Washington courtroom. In a case initiated in 2012, climate scientist Michael E. Mann is alleging he was defamed by journalist Mark Steyn in a commentary in National Review in July of that year titled “Football and Hockey.” But rest assured that this trial is not a sports case. Reports from the courthouse show Steyn, a Canadian and former National Post columnist, arriving in a wheelchair following heart attacks, to conduct his own defence in a case that has been dragged through a decade of legal wrangling. The trial is before a jury burdened with what looks like tens of thousands of pages of evidence filled with some of the most contentious libel and science issues. The hockey part of Steyn’s 2012 commentary refers to Mann’s best-known achievement: a graph published in 2001 by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that allegedly represents global temperatures dating back 1,000 years. The trend line in the graph shows relatively stable temperatures over hundreds of years but then shoots almost straight up in the 20th century. With its sharp upward surge angled toward 2000, the graph instantly became known as “The Hockey Stick Curve.” The graph soon became a powerful and effective piece of supposed evidence for makers of climate policy and a near-religious icon that activists continue to revere. Coverage of the Mann-Steyn trial has been minimal in major media, except to raise the hockey stick even higher up the totem of policy worship. When the trial opened last month, The Guardian said Mann was an “esteemed” and “renowned” climate scientist who had been attacked by Steyn as part of a “network of climate sceptics” that continues to produce “online abuse of climate scientists” funded by fossil fuel industries. Anyone interested in a different perspective on the trial can turn to non-media reports from the Heartland Institute and on Steyn’s website, where trial sessions are dramatized by actors and narrators. Mann appeared as a witness on Monday under questioning from Steyn, who asked about the time Mann spread a story about climate scientist Judith Curry, former chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Mann, upset with her climate science, once claimed in emails that Curry as a student had an affair with a married man named Webster. “Judy Curry was a graduate student. Affairs, ugly divorce, et cetera, yada, yada. Webster and Curry left together … to the relief of everyone I know here who was around then.” Mann signed the email “mike.” But Curry was not in fact a student at the time, and the story actually involved another woman. Mann on Tuesday admitted the affair stories were “rumours I was passing along” and that his “facts could be wrong.” Curry was expected to testify later this week, despite having been described by Mann as “a serial misinformer when it comes to science.” When it comes to science, Mann claims supreme authority and eagerly portrays his hockey stick as an icon that has helped drive climate policy. In his self-congratulatory 2021 book, The New Climate War, he said the hockey stick “was far more compelling to a layperson than the other abstract statistical work behind the key findings of the previous (IPCC) reports.” But was the layperson’s instant guide to climate change solid science? It certainly looks authoritative. But from the beginning a number of scientists and experts severely criticized the data and methods behind its formulation. Among the leading critics were two Canadians: Guelph University economist Ross McKitrick and retired mining analyst Steve McIntyre Full post see also: Francis Menton: Further Notes On Mann v. Steyn: The Plaintiff Rests 9) Matthew Lynn: Ignore the French: Net Zero is destroying British industry, not Brexit The Daily Telegraph, 31 January 2024 Our fixation with decarbonisation will be economically ruinous. On the continent, it could be even worse Sectors will go into terminal decline. Traditional industries will close. And blue-collar workers will lose forever the kind of well-paid jobs that could support a family. France’s youthful new Prime Minister Gabriel Attal took some time off yesterday from working out how to deal with the siege of Paris to blame Brexit for the decline of Britain’s heavy industry, and to warn that France could go the same way if it loosened its ties with Brussels. This is quite a stretch. While industry might be struggling, it is our fanatical obsession Net Zero that is to blame, not Brexit. For a 34-year-old who has only been in the job for a couple of weeks, Attal certainly doesn’t lack self-confidence. Like his mentor, President Macron, he has the answer to just about everything. In the French Parliament this week, he tore into Britain’s decision to leave the EU. “Last week, because of Brexit, the last blast furnaces in Great Britain closed. Steel is no longer produced in the UK. In France, on the contrary, thanks in particular to Europe, industry is coming back,” he said. Sure, it is an argument that may play well with French politicians. Whacking the English is always a good way to assert your authority in the Assemblée Nationale. The trouble is, Attal has got this one wrong on two counts. First, there is very little evidence that our departure from the EU has made much difference to industry one way or another. After all, we are doing just as well, or poorly, as our rivals on the other side of the channel. France’s industrial output is estimated to have fallen by 0.5pc in the fourth quarter of last year, and expanded by just 0.1pc in the quarter before that. German industrial output is in freefall, and it is now more than 9pc below its pre-pandemic peak. In fact, although it may come as a surprise to Attal, the UK is now a larger manufacturing nation than France, with annual output of $272 billion compared with $262 billion for our closest neighbour, according to figures from Make UK. The last time I checked, both France and Germany were still inside the EU. It is hard to conclude from those figures that British manufacturing has suffered significantly, from our departure. Next, and more importantly, it was Net Zero that killed off steel making in Port Talbot. The government decided to give Tata Steel £500 million to close down its traditional blast furnaces, and replace them with electric ones, which, while they generate less carbon dioxide, also employ far fewer workers. If there was more flexibility in the target, and some recognition that the UK was the first major developed country to halve its emissions, the plants would have been perfectly viable for many more years. At the same time, sky high energy prices, demented planning rules, and very soon carbon taxes as well, all demanded by the Net Zero fanatics, are making the operating environment tougher for industry than at any time over the last 50 years. The irony is that Attal, along with the mandarins in Brussels that he champions, is even more committed to accelerating the drive to Net Zero than British politicians are. Indeed, the mini-Macron is facing angry protests from farmers across France this week over his government’s fanatical imposition of climate targets. At the same time, the EU itself is doubling down on commitment to Net Zero, with the Commission set to announce a new target next week to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 90pc by 2040, a mandate that would require a vast round of spending, and huge taxes on industry. Attal’s comments may have been driven by concerns over the forthcoming European Parliament elections, which polls indicate will be bruising for Emmanuel Macron’s Renew alliance. Marine Le Pen’s hard-Right National Rally (RN) may need to break EU rules in order to fulfil its agenda – which may elicit support from the farmers currently camping out on Autoroute 6. Polls put the RN a full 10 points ahead of President Emmanuel Macron’s Renew alliance ahead of this summer’s European Parliament elections. It is easy to blame Brexit for anything that goes wrong. But in reality, it is Net Zero that is killing off British industry, and very soon it will be killing off what remains of French industry as well. 10) You couldn’t make it up! German Greens push to water down EU party’s climate targets EurActiv, 31 January 2024 The European Green Party is set for an internal battle over climate targets at a party congress this weekend (2-4 February), with the German Greens pushing to postpone the climate neutrality goals by five years and scrap parts of the gas and oil phase-out policies. The European Green Party’s (EGP) draft manifesto, first reported on by Euractiv, calls on the EU to bring forward by ten years its target date for climate neutrality, from 2050 to 2040. The German Greens have other plans, though, as they are now trying to push the manifesto’s target back to 2045, according to proposed amendments seen by Euractiv. The manifesto will be discussed at the conference in Lyon and the final version adopted on Sunday (4 February). The Germans are also pushing to remove calls to end the use of fossil gas by 2035 and of oil by 2040, keeping only the draft’s target of phasing out coal by 2030, as well as a call to prohibit financial services “for coal, oil and gas extraction, coal-fired energy projects, and the companies that develop them”. The 2045 climate neutrality goal is already part of the Germany’s governing coalition agreement between the Greens, centre-left SPD and liberal FDP The German Greens are thus looking to align the European Greens’ climate goal with the official line of the German coalition government. Full story 

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