The center of Lamia was filled with dozens of tractors and farmers, on Friday (26/1) at noon, from the large mobilization carried out by the Agricultural Associations reaching the entrance of the neoclassical building in Eleftherias Square where they also left a ball of straw blocking the entrance to the offices of PE Fthiotida.

Indicative of the impressive mobilization, was that the parked agricultural and commercial vehicles, starting from Eleftherias Square at the beginning of Diakou, continued to Ypsilanti, Kazoulis and Karaiskakis, to Laou Square at the height of Kolokotroni.

Farmers and breeders in Western Macedonia went on coordinated mobilizations today, in an attempt to highlight the problems plaguing their sector and “threaten – as they say – the sustainability of agricultural and livestock production”.

Kozani

Farmers and breeders from the Agricultural and Livestock Associations of Kozani, Eordaia and Amyntaio with their tractors lined up, marched in the city of Kozani, where their representatives met with the mayor Yiannis Kokkaliaris and then blocked for half an hour the building of the Region where they had a meeting with the Regional Governor G. Amanatidis.

The issues related to the aid from the implementation of the new CAP are at the center of the discussions and seem to be the spearhead of the mobilizations.

As Dimitris Moschos, a farmer from Polykarpi, Kastoria, whose family farm was awarded by the EU in 2023 as the best in Europe, “the reduction in the income of our colleagues from the implementation of the new CAP for animal and plant derivative amounts to an average of 52%”.

He emphasized that “this is money missing from our wallet, without having direct or indirect responsibility for the specific result” laying the blame on the government which as it claims “did not inform the agricultural and livestock world of its actions in time».

The farmers of Kozani, after their meeting with the Regional Governor G. Amanatidis, lined up their tractors at the intersection of Egnatia Street in Koila Kozani and as stated by Stathis Paschalidis from the beginning of next week “it will be sought in coordination with the other blocks in the Region to block the Egnatia junction in Siatista».

Kastoria

In Kastoria, the farmers and breeders have lined up their tractors at the entrance of the city of Kastoria, on the Avenue of the Swans and have announced for Monday a short-term blockade of the District building during their meeting with the deputy governor of Kastoria.

Dimitris Moschos said that next week, after consultation, all the farmers of Western Macedonia will travel by bus to the pan-agricultural mobilization that will take place in Thessaloniki.

Grevena

In Grevena, the farmers withdrew from the building of the Vice-Region and lined up their tractors at the intersection of Egnatia Street in Myrsina.

Mr. Babis Orfanidis from Karpero Grevenon spoke about the effects of the EU’s green policies on agricultural production, pointing out that “while in the field of the automobile industry, fertilizers, agricultural supplies, we as consumers are already paying the rapid rise in prices, at the same time the our agricultural and livestock products that apply environmental practices, how is it explained that their prices are falling in the field”.

LAMIA REPORT/APE