In a country of less than 18 million people and more than 116 million livestock, agriculture reigns supreme.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 Less than 18 million people and more than 116 million livestock like chicken, pig and
00:07 cattle. The Netherlands is the second largest exporter of agricultural products in the world
00:12 and half of its land is devoted to agriculture, an agri-food superpower despite its tiny size.
00:19 Which could turn into a problem for emissions, including nitrogen, a chemical element that
00:25 in high concentrations is dangerous for nature and water quality. Almost all human activities
00:30 produce it but in the Netherlands agriculture is the biggest culprit responsible for 50%
00:35 of all nitrogen emissions.
00:39 Basically there in the Netherlands there are two big reasons why we have a nitrogen problem.
00:44 On the first hand it's, we are a very densely populated area and we have the most dense
00:50 livestock concentration in Europe. And on the other hand the Netherlands has taken a
00:56 rather strict interpretation of European Habitats Directive which stipulates that for every new
01:03 kind of activity we have to realize nitrogen reduction elsewhere.
01:10 The previous government set a goal of halving its emissions by 2030. For this farmers are
01:15 required to reduce their nitrogen footprint or sell their properties to the Dutch state
01:19 which put in place a voluntary buyout scheme with a budget of 8 billion euros. But for
01:24 now it's not been very popular explains Jan Arijcurrivar who owns 115 cows on his 90 hectare
01:30 property in South Holland. He produces 100 million liters of milk per year in an almost
01:36 100% organic way and he believes the government should focus more on boosting innovation rather
01:41 than reducing the size of farms.
01:43 But a lot of farmers are worried because it's not clear for them what they need to do on
01:48 their farm to meet the demands of the government. I think there are also possibilities to reduce
01:54 emissions for dairy farmers as well if you can help them with the funding to reduce that
01:59 with technological innovations. We do not have that type of measurements yet and the
02:05 other thing would be that the government helps to make your farm more extensive. So to help
02:10 for instance with the availability of land.
02:13 But the issue has turned controversial ahead of the country's elections next week. While
02:17 farmers are pushing back against the current provisions some parties and environmental
02:21 associations want even more. They're asking for mandatory buyouts instead of voluntary
02:26 ones halving emissions by 2030 and stricter targets on livestock reduction.
02:33 We demand that the government helps farmers make the transition to ecological farming
02:37 with 70% fewer animals in 2030 and 80% fewer in 2050 and actually helps farmers or helps
02:44 you know the market set up a system in such a way that the farmer also has a good income
02:49 you know producing like food for humans instead of a lot of food for animals.
02:57 The concerns of environmentalists and farmers will probably be heard in the vote on 22 November
03:02 and are destined to influence the composition of the new Dutch parliament.
03:08 Vincenzo Genovese, Euronews, Laia.
03:11 [Whoosh]