PICS: Hundreds of Tractors Blockade EU Capital as Farmers Protest Green Agenda

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HATIM KAGHAT/BELGA MAG/AFP via Getty Images

BRUSSELS (AP) – Hundreds of tractors driven by angry farmers protesting a plan to cut nitrate levels converged on Brussels on Friday, creating major traffic disruption in Belgium’s capital city.

The BB farmers union and several others combined efforts to gather more than 2,700 farm vehicles, according to Brussels police.

Several major roads in Brussels were closed and police warned that disruptions could last until the end of the day, recommending that people use public transportation instead of personal cars.

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Protesters stand near burning tyres during a demonstration called by Flemish farmers to protest against new proposed rules to reduce nitrogen emissions, in Brussels, on March 3rd, 2023. Slow-moving convoys of some 2,700 tractors blocked roads in Brussels on March 3rd, as Flemish farmers protested over a green push by the government of their Dutch-speaking region aimed at slashing nitrogen emissions from fertilisers and livestock. The production and use of nitrogen fertilisers generates climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions, as does livestock waste. (Photo by KENZO TRIBOUILLARD/AFP via Getty Images)

The Flemish regional government is struggling to find a deal to cut nitrate pollution over farmers’ objections that it would put many out of business.

Farmers also claim that their trade has to make much deeper cuts than industry and want to see a more equitable spread.

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Flemish farmers take their tractors to the city centre of Brussels, to protest against proposed new rules to reduce nitrogen emissions, on Friday 3rd March 2023. The Flemish Government is debating measures to reduce the emissions of the industry and the agricultural sector. (Photo by JAMES ARTHUR GEKIERE/BELGA MAG/AFP via Getty Images)

“In the future, I want to have the possibility to continue my dad’s farm,” said farmer Brendt Beyens. “But right now I feel like the possibility of that happening is slowly shrinking and it’s getting nearly impossible and the is future looking very tough.”

Negotiations have lingered for weeks and weakened the regional government of northern Belgium to breaking point.

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Protesters hold Flemish flags as farmers ride tractors during a demonstration called by Flemish farmers to protest against new rules to reduce nitrogen emissions in Brussels, on March 3, 2023. (Photo by KENZO TRIBOUILLARD/AFP via Getty Images)

The debate over agricultural pollution is increasingly turning into a political issue in many of the EU’s farming nations. It is to be a focal point of Dutch elections in two weeks’ time and is also affecting Belgium, another EU nation where intensive farming has put environmentalists against the agricultural lobby.

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A flag for the Farmers Defence Force on a tractor during a protest by farmers from Belgium’s northern region of Flanders against the regional government’s nitrogen emissions policy, in Brussels, Belgium, on Friday, March 3rd, 2023. Hundreds of tractors driven by farmers converged on the Belgian capital creating major traffic disruption as the debate over agricultural pollution increasingly turns into a political issue in many of the European Union’s farming nations. (Photographer: Valeria Mongelli/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

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