If The Dutch Government Thought Its Farmers Would Submit To Environmental Statism Easily, It Was Wrong

In a bid to defend their property rights, Dutch farmers showed up in droves in the de facto capital of the Netherlands on Saturday to protest their government’s overreaching climate policies, which demonstrators say will impede their ability to make a living.

Gathered in The Hague, over 10,000 farmers protested against the national government’s plans to halve the country’s nitrogen emissions by 2030. Under the guise of climate alarmism, Dutch officials are seeking to cap “emissions of nitrogen oxides from farm animal manure and … ammonia in fertilizer” by closing up to 3,000 farms near so-called “environmentally sensitive areas” over the next year.

While the government has claimed these closures will initially be voluntary, the threat of compulsory land buyouts for those who fail to comply with the program by the fall makes it a clear attack on basic property rights.

“We see the farmers around us, and we know how important our farmers are. How will we eat if we don’t produce food?” one protestor told Rebel News. “For all those families, they [have been] there for centuries. It’s their country. They made it bloom.” Government officials are “lying to our faces. They’re trying to steal the companies from the farmers, and they’re trying to take our freedom away,” another said.

The Saturday demonstration was hardly the first of its kind. As The Federalist reported, an estimated 40,000 farmers in tractors and trucks participated in protests last year, clogging up major highways and blockading supermarket distribution centers in protest of the regulations.

In some instances, the government responded to protestors with brutal force, deploying tear gas and dogs to break up demonstrations in cities such as...

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