Translated from Polish by Google
Farmers' protest at the border - what is it about, who is doing it and who benefits from it. Longer reading.
Recently, farmers' protests, which have been taking place in Western Europe for many months, also came to Poland. And immediately we were flooded with a wave of contradictory news, disinformation, emotional ecstasy and radical political views presented as facts. I will try to explain this topic to you and unravel it a bit, because the matter is serious and concerns state security. Especially since sock-skeptical groups got involved in the protest.
Let's start from the beginning. The European Union has been pushing forward a project to reduce the emission intensity of its economy for several years. The goal is for the community to achieve zero emissions (i.e. to generate as much CO2 as is naturally absorbed by the biosphere) by 2050. This largest program is the European Green Deal, which sets the framework for the entire project for the next 26 years. The Green Deal covers many issues, such as energy production, industrial production and the automotive industry. And also agriculture, which is responsible for a significant percentage of emissions (10.5% in 2018 [1 ]) . This is, so to speak, a Big Project.
The Green Deal (Big Project) consists of a number of smaller concepts. Including the Common Agricultural Policy (which is intended to unify agricultural policy in EU countries) and the "Fit for 55" concept (which assumes reducing CO2 emissions by 55% by 2030, so you can think of it as a Smaller Project or Sub-Project). [2] It is important not to confuse these three concepts. I recommend this article by Konkret24, where it is explained in detail [3]. It contains links to the program documents of these concepts, as well as statements by PiS politicians on this subject, to which I will return in a moment.
As with any transformation project, there are justified concerns that certain groups will be disadvantaged. It is no different in this matter. Farmers in various European countries argue that the proposed solutions are too restrictive, which will harm their enterprises and, consequently, lead to a radical increase in prices or even a collapse of food production in the EU [7]. For this reason, over the last few years farmers have been protesting in various European countries from the Netherlands [4], Germany [5] and recently also in France [6]. And also in Poland, already in 2019 or 2022 [3].
This is a pan-European background. And now an important distinction: in Poland, IN ADDITION TO THIS, we have a second layer of the problem, which is the import of Ukrainian agricultural produce. The cause and effect chain looks, briefly, as follows. Ukraine is a large food producer. Russia blocked (later: significantly limited) Ukraine's ability to export produce by sea. So in May 2022, the EU abolished customs duties on grains imported from Ukraine to facilitate their export by land [8] . As expected by many, grain from Ukraine did not transit through Poland, but was distributed on our market as it was much cheaper [9]. For this reason, last year the EU banned imports for several months, and then lifted the ban [10] [11]. Therefore, Ukrainian grain once again flowed to the EU, again being much cheaper than that produced by EU farmers, including Poles.
So let's understand clearly what is happening. Across the EU, farmers are protesting primarily against the EU's climate goals in the field of agriculture. But in Poland, the aspect of importing Ukrainian grain, which is significantly cheaper than Polish grain, seems to be more important. Therefore, two things are happening in parallel. Farmers are protesting in several hundred places throughout the country, including large cities such as Wrocław [12] [13]. And in parallel, they blocked the border crossings with Ukraine [14]. And here we come to the key aspect of the whole matter.
Up to this point, we have two layers of the cake: the protest of European (including Polish) farmers against EU policy and the protest of only Polish farmers against the import of Ukrainian grain. We are now laying further layers on the foundation thus prepared: PiS's political war with the rest of the world, the Confederation's idiotic attempt to establish itself, the activity of anti-system and sock-sceptic circles, classic pseudo-patriotic hysteria, progressive anarchy and the incompetence of the state and the media. We pour the icing of Putin's propaganda over the whole thing and decorate it with the icing of a state-destabilizing provocation. And tick, we have a cross-border disinformation cake, the consumption of which may have negative consequences for the entire region. Please serve with champagne open in the Kremlin. Let's look at these layers one by one.
PiS vs. the EU, KO and… er… PiS…
Of course, they use this to say that a new government has arrived, which out of pure hatred for farmers (the salt of the earth, the basis of the economy, etc.) decided to fulfill the EU's satanic plan and starve Poles. Suddenly they remembered that they were against this whole green transformation, even though it was their government that co-created it a year ago, their prime minister praised it as perfectly consistent with the PiS agricultural program, and finally it was their EU commissioner who was presented as its author. Of course, that's the past. Now the logic of this stage is that KO and other non-PiS MEPs voted for the Green Deal in 2019, so it is their fault. Because PiS voted against it this one time, although later it praised the project [3]. At the same time, politicians from both PiS and KO constantly confuse the EU programs mentioned at the beginning, increasing the chaos [3]. Of course, such rhetoric is very destabilizing because it inflames, well, subversive moods. Well, if the government wants to destroy Polish agriculture, we have to fight back, right? And Mariusz Błaszczak has already called for a full embargo on all Ukrainian agricultural goods, although just a moment ago he was a member of the government that was unable to organize transit and led to our market being flooded with these very products [19].
Confederation.
Unlike PiS, Confederosians do not have much on their plate right now, but they really need to be present before the elections. Therefore, while for Kaczyński the blockade is one topic among many, the boys got into it like a boar into acorns. Seriously, go to any of Konfa's social media and you will see almost nothing but this protest. And an MP, Ryszard Wilk (not to be confused with Jacek Wilk), even made a Powerful Parliamentary Intervention, during which, with his buttocks tensed, he approached the spilled corn, showed it to the camera, and then put it in his pocket, nobody knows why. [17] But back: one of the organizers is Rafał Mekler, head of Konfa's Lublin structures. Mekler, typical of this party, is obsessed with Bandera, claims that Ukrainian immigrants are "changing the composition of Poland" and repeats narratives about fabulously rich refugees who drive around in expensive cars. It also uses the beautiful name "Geuropean Union" [42], imported from Russia. Just like Krzysiu Bosak, on behalf of all of us, he even billed Ukraine for aid for a modest amount of PLN 100 billion [15]. The bill is still posted on the Confederation's website [16]. Another organizer and self-proclaimed people's tribune was a certain Hubert Ojdana, who, of course, also ran from Confa's list [18] and has made statements praising the prospect of Russian victory [20]. Ojdana has already become a Confederate martyr because he is said to have received threats from the Ukrainian services [21]. Confederates could be listed for a long time, I will only mention the anti-vaccine Brownist Karolina Pikuła, who calls the situation "an execution on the Polish nation", and who has just become this party's candidate for the president of Rzeszów [28].
Interestingly, the Confederates talk a lot about the quality of Ukrainian grain, which is supposedly poisoned, moldy and so on. If I were malicious, I would recall the statements of various Sośnierze that sanitary control is leftism, but I am not malicious.
If I were really malicious, I would ask the Confederates why they have nothing against importing Russian grain, which, according to the UkrAgroConsult website, is more plentiful than Ukrainian [29], but I'm really not malicious.
Sock skeptics
The Confederation's circles, of course, smoothly intertwine with openly pro-Putin activists. A number of well-known Kremlin propagandists have already appeared on the border and have suddenly become very interested in agriculture. So we have Jerzy Andrzejewski from the Safe Poland party recently created by geopolitics expert Leszek Sykulski, who Andrzejewski called for peace and honor from a trailer, repeated the narrative about replacing pig farming with worms, stated that he misses the "murdered" "best Pole", i.e. following Andrzej Lepper, and called the current actions of enemy forces terrorism that will destroy Poland [22]. Moreover, Safe Poland also actively supports the protest [25] [27]. Sykulski himself, who of course considers himself a pacifist, claims that we face a choice: either we will reach an agreement with Russia and Belarus, or we will get food from Ukraine and "LGBT gender from the West" [24]. Andrzejewski is also accompanied by Piotr Panasiuk [23], whose social media I recommend to anyone who wants to get acquainted with the Kremlin's current propaganda lines. Also active in the media is, for example, Roland Dubowski, author of Myśli Polska [44], former activist of the Camp of Greater Poland, who could not be there because he was commemorating Soviet soldiers in Warmia, of course in the company of the Russian ambassador, as well as former activists of Change: Piskorski and Jankowski [26]. Let us add that the coverage of the crossing in Dorohusk was made by the well-known disinformation television, hold on, MIR TV [36]. Let us add that Marzanna Gontarska, among others, reports for this television. I'll let you guess which party she ran for [38]. The protest seems to be coordinated by the Institute of Agricultural Economy. Contrary to the name, it is not a government institution, but a private think-tank belonging to the fur industry tycoon and millionaire friend of Rydzyk, Szczepan Wójcik [43].
Hysteria.
Let's first recall what's actually happening. Farmers across Europe are afraid that EU regulations will hit their businesses. I leave aside whether this will actually be the case - they have the right to be afraid and angry about it. On the other hand, Polish farmers are afraid that dumping prices of Ukrainian agricultural produce will hit their businesses. They have the right to be afraid and angry about it. Both have the right to protest. But both problems can be solved through simple legislative changes. For example, some time ago, in an almost similar way, the EU provided a protective mechanism for miners, and has already made some concessions to farmers [7]. The issue of importing Ukrainian grain was supposed to be handled differently from the beginning - the grain was to transit through Poland to non-EU markets. I don't know how easy or difficult it is to implement this, but implementing it basically solves the problem, and the talks between Warsaw and Kiev are apparently at the end [34]. These are the facts. However, due to the activity of PiS, Confederation and sock skeptics, as well as the incompetence (including media) of the government, the image of the protest as almost a new national uprising is spreading on social media. Following the example of a French artist who, with the help of artificial intelligence, created images of farmers filling Paris with grain [30], Polish social media is full of similar graphics. In one, a column of farmers marches forward under a flag, led by a huge eagle. Next to it is a touching photo of a child on a mini-tractor, greeting protesters with the Polish flag. Next to it are calls for the overthrow of the government [31]. In the second one, probably from the same session in Midjourney, an eagle leads a column of flagged tractors [32]. In another, an old farmer sheds tears over sprouts of grain, and in the background Polish flags wave over golden fields [33]. And so on, ad nauseam. An ordinary protest (large, but still ordinary), which was common in Poland under every government, suddenly grows into an anti-state rebellion. The divisions are deepening. Deep beliefs about the oppressive government and the EU become embedded in people's heads. Vladimir Vladimirovich likes this.
Anarchy.
The above phenomena have already led to it, at least locally. Some self-appointed guards are patrolling the area and escaping from the "nears" [41]. Someone opens it and pours out Ukrainian grain [35]. Someone is checking Ukrainian trucks. Someone claims that weapons are transported in refrigerated trucks, someone says it's "food without a queue" [37] [39]. Someone publishes photos of moldy corn, claiming that it was imported from Ukraine, which cannot be verified, but this does not prevent the authors from saying that they are poisoning us [40] [41]. Such a situation is unacceptable anywhere, but on the border, and even now, it is simply a failure of the state. We are talking about the external border of the EU and NATO. In addition, about the border through which military equipment and humanitarian aid passes to Ukraine, which is fighting Russian imperialism. Any slowdown in these supplies pleases only one country: Russia. It is impossible not to control such a place [48]. Meanwhile, it seems that in the general elation it goes unnoticed that famous pro-Russian activists, anti-Covid lunatics and... who? Well, we don't really know. In such circumstances it is very easy to…
Provocations.
They have already happened. In addition to the self-proclaimed controls mentioned above, the protest includes anti-Ukrainian content that brings back memories from the spring of 2022. So we compare the current situation to, of course, Volhynia [45]. We have a graphic that was popular two years ago, with a Polish figure digging out a Ukrainian figure from a contour map of Poland, with the caption "end of hospitality, ungrateful bastards..." [46]. All these activities aim at the same thing. To quarrel us with the Ukrainians, to convince us that it is in our interest for Ukraine to lose. Convince us of the need to "reach an agreement with Russia". And, no less important, to convince Ukrainians that we are their enemies and cannot be counted on. By the way, the situation on the border is already being heated in the Russian media as "evidence" of social resistance to support for Ukraine, which comes back to us in the form of slightly changed narratives [47]. It happens with very little means and can be very effective. Unfortunately, the state has no control over it yet, and the media focuses on the very fact of the protests, paying little attention to who takes part in them.
Let's summarize.
The EU's energy transformation may hit European agriculture. And the import of cheap Ukrainian grain without EU certificates affects Polish agriculture. But these are things that need to be dealt with at the legal level, taking into account the demands of the interest group such as farmers. However, on this foundation, we have built a megalithic structure of anti-European, anti-Ukrainian and openly pro-Russian lies, manipulation and pseudo-patriotic hysteria. A simple thing was wrapped in emotional narratives with far-reaching geopolitical consequences. The farmers' protest is being used instrumentally by political parties (PiS, but above all Confederation), openly pro-Russian movements, ordinary provocateurs and self-appointed sheriffs who do not know who they represent. And by Kremlin propaganda, which will happily show everyone (Poles, Ukrainians, Russians) that all of Europe is on the threshold of some kind of civil war between oppressed citizens and oppressive governments.
Vladimir Vladimirovich likes this. And very much so.