As of: January 26, 2024, 5:27 p.m
By: Johannes Thoma
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“The barrel has overflowed”: With sayings like these, farmers expressed their dissatisfaction with the traffic light plans at the day of action in and in front of the Hochlandhalle.
© rudder
Hubert Aiwanger railed against the traffic light plans in the Weilheimer Hochlandhalle during the BBV action day.
Weilheim
- Even before he had said a word, there was loud applause and even a short birthday serenade for him: Hubert Aiwanger, who turned 53 yesterday, had a home game when he appeared in the Weilheimer Hochlandhalle in front of around 600 farmers.
And the Bavarian Economics Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and secret Agriculture Minister knew what the visitors to the day of action against the traffic light plans expected from him: rail against “those up there” and complain about “ideologues in Berlin” who are ensuring that “the country goes down the drain.”
Most of Aiwanger's statements are familiar to visitors, after all, in recent weeks he has spoken at dozens of events at which farmers protested against the dismantling of their tax breaks.
Aiwanger does not present himself to the farmers as a minister, but as one of their own who knows where their problems are.
The Greens are basically to blame for everything
Rhetorically clever and, when necessary, loudly, Aiwanger blames the traffic lights, especially the Greens, for all the long-known problems in agriculture, even though the government has only been in office for two years.
What remains unmentioned, for example, is that the Free Voters' coalition partner, the CSU, provided the Federal Minister of Agriculture between 2005 and 2018.
The visitors react with thunderous applause to Aiwanger's polemics such as “that the Greens cannot distinguish a cow from a pig”.
Of course, farmers know that the statements are populist.
They don't applaud the content, but rather the form - there is a beer tent atmosphere in the Hochlandhalle.
This was also confirmed by an organic farmer from the Landsberg area who came to the rally: The planned gradual abolition of the agricultural diesel refund would cost him 400 to 500 euros per year.
“It's a small item, but the worst thing is the bureaucracy, it's a problem for all of us,” he says, pointing with his thumb and forefinger at a distance of around two centimeters - that's how thick the forms are that are filled out just for the refund would have to.
The farmer suspects that the planned gradual reduction of the subsidy was the last straw.
That's why the protests are so massive.
CSU now wants to reduce bureaucracy
Back to the event organized by the BBV district associations of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Weilheim-Schongau and Starnberg: Aiwanger is now railing just as heatedly against heat pumps as against new nature parks.
The latter would lead to the oak forests in the Free State disappearing if the oak beetle raged unhindered.
As is so often the case, the minister lacks evidence of this.
For him one thing is certain: the forest is being destroyed by the Greens.
Even if Federal Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir, like him, supports the shooting of the wolf, there is criticism: In reality, according to Aiwanger, Özdemir doesn't want that at all; his lawyers in the ministry will definitely know how to prevent it, he suspects.
In the shadow of Aiwanger stands the second speaker, the CSU state parliament member and chairwoman of the agriculture committee, Petra Högl.
She criticizes the fact that “the three gentlemen at the traffic lights” do not negotiate with the farmers on an equal footing.
A practitioners' council has now been convened in the Free State to work on reducing bureaucracy in agriculture, says Högl, who also admits that "not everything went smoothly in the past".
Overall, the event was quiet: although many farmers drove their tractors to the Hochlandhalle, there were no major disruptions in the city, according to the police.
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Sees himself as an advocate for agriculture: Bavaria's Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger in the Hochlandhalle.
© ralf ruder