Since the EU’s earliest days, angry farmers have wasted no opportunity to take to the barricades when confronted with centralised policies they dislike.
From the 1960s onwards, any serious talk of reforms affecting their industry has been guaranteed to bring labourers and landowners from the fields to do battle with Brussels riot police. Often, they have won.
The decades-long tradition continued in December, when tractors dumped muck and growers hurled potatoes on the streets of Belgium’s capital. The offending policy was a blockbuster trade deal between the EU and the Mercosur bloc of Latin American countries, which beef, dairy and poultry producers fear will drive them out of business.
您已阅读5%（694字），剩余95%（14106字）包含更多重要信息，订阅以继续探索完整内容，并享受更多专属服务。