French farmers close in on Paris as protests ratchet up pressure on President Macron

Snowballing protests by French farmers crept closer to Paris on Thursday, with tractors driving in convoys and blocking roads in many regions of the country to ratchet up pressure for government measures to protect the influential agricultural sector from foreign competition, red tape, rising costs and poverty-level pay for the worst-off producers.

Protesters’ traffic-snarling slowdowns, barricades of straw bales, dumps of agricultural waste outside government offices and other demonstrations have rapidly blown up into the first major crisis for new Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, installed two weeks ago by President Emmanuel Macron in an effort to inject new vigor into his administration.

Macron’s opponents are seizing on the farmers’ demonstrations to bash his government’s record ahead of European elections in June. Marine Le Pen, the French far-right leader whose National Rally party is polling strongly, blamed free-trade deals, imports and bureaucracy for farmers’ economic woes.

“The worst enemies of farmers are ... in this government,” she said Thursday.

Roads hit Thursday by farmers’ traffic slowdowns included a highway west of the French capital and seat of power.

“We are getting progressively closer to Paris,” farmer David Lavenant told BFM-TV.

Two agricultural unions called for farmers to converge on highways into the city on Friday to blockade it.

One highway company reported blockages on 14 motorways it operates, as well as disruptions on others. Protests elsewhere included a supermarket being showered with a thick jet of pig slurry.

“We’re hit from both sides with high fixed costs but low prices. You don’t need a drawing to imagine what our balance sheets look like,” said Benoit Mazure, a regional representative of the agricultural union FNSEA.

Protest leaders said farmers would closely scrutinize expected measures from the government Friday in response to their demands before deciding on their next steps.

“The determination is total,” said Arnaud Rousseau, the union’s president. “We expect urgent measures.”

In Brussels, European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen opened a discussion panel on farming to take into account some of the complaints raised by protesters around the 27-nation bloc.

Farmers in Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Romania have also staged protests in recent weeks.

The dialogue on agriculture comes as campaigning for the June 6-9 EU parliamentary elections is picking up steam, with the fate of the farm sector expected to be a hot-button issue.

“The challenges are without any question mounting ... be it the competition from abroad, be it over-regulation at home, be it climate change, or the loss of biodiversity, or be [it] demographic decline, just to name a few,” Von der Leyen said.