Farmers in Germany are blocking roads with tractors to protest against cuts in subsidies. Around 200 tractors are parked near Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate.
There are also traffic jams in Baden-Württemberg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Saxony and Bavaria.
The government reduced subsidies to save money because a court said their budget plan was against the law.
The cuts didn’t work and now people are worried that the argument will make the far right more popular.
In response to the blockades, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said that blocking people from going to work, school, or to see a doctor will make people upset and cause arguments.
The farmers are very angry, and their group, DBV, wants the government to stop all the plans to reduce subsidies for farmers.
“Joachim Rukwied, the head of DBV, said that if things don’t change, there won’t be enough good food available. ”
Ministers are rushing to fix a money problem of tens of billions of euros after a big decision in November by Germany‘s highest court. The court said the government’s budget was not allowed.
However, later ideas to stop giving farmers tax breaks for agricultural diesel have been weakened. Now, the change will happen gradually over time. The government decided not to get rid of special treatment in vehicle tax.
However, farmers are still angry and a group of protesters stopped the Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck from getting off a ferry last week.
The protest caused a lot of people to be angry and worried that political discussions in Germany are becoming more extreme.
But the other leader of the far right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, Alice Weidel, said that the incident proved that the vice chancellor was not being respected anymore.
“He would rather escape on a ferry than talk,” she wrote.
The AfD is getting more popular in the polls and has been scoring higher than the three parties in power.
The group in charge of Germany is having a lot of arguments and it’s causing tension.
Important local elections will happen later this year in three eastern states – Saxony, Brandenburg and Thuringia. These elections will show how the people in these areas are feeling.
Train drivers are going to go on strike, which will create more problems for the government.
The GDL union in Germany has announced that its members will go on strike starting this Wednesday because they are in a disagreement with the railway company Deutsche Bahn over their wages.
As the tractors arrive in central Berlin, it is a bad start to the year for Chancellor Scholz’s government. It also comes with predictions of slow economic growth for a country that is often called the EU’s “powerhouse”.
Tag: Tractor
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Tractor-wielding farmers roadblock Berlin after reduction of subsidies
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The world’s fastest tractor is faster than some sports cars
The JCB Fastrac Two is a stripped-down and performance-enhanced JCB Fastrac tractor capable of reaching speeds of up to 247 km per hour (153.8 mph).
If you’ve ever driven behind a tractor, you probably already know that they are many things, but they certainly aren’t fast. Tractors are built for power, not speed, but what if someone wanted to make a tractor go really fast? Well, a few years ago, a team at English tractor manufacturer JCB set out to do just that and managed to set a new Guinness record for the world’s fastest tractor with a modified version of the company’s Fastrac tractor. Over two two-kilometer runs, it averaged a speed of 135 mph (217.6 km/h) and a peak speed of 153.771 mph (247 km/h).
Powered by JCB’s proprietary 7.2-liter, 6-cylinder Dieselmax engine, the record-breaking Fastrac Two had a peak power of 1,016 hp backed up by over 2,500 Nm of torque. Those are some impressive numbers, but keep in mind that even in its stripped-down form, this thing weighed a whopping five tons, so the team had to develop innovative solutions for improving aerodynamics in order to achieve their goals.
“Getting a five-tonne tractor to safely reach 150 mph and stop again is not an easy task,” JCB Chief Innovation and Growth Officer, Tim Burnhope, said. “We’re all so proud to have not only reached these goals but to have exceeded them.”
Interestingly, another JCB Fastrac tractor had set a world speed record only months before – an average speed of 103.6 mph (166 km/h) – but the engineering team were certain they could do better, so after making some adjustment they gave it another go, and in November of 2019, at Elvington Airfield in the UK, they managed to break their own record.
“When we reached 103.6 mph with the Fastrac in the summer, I was convinced we could go even faster and the JCB team has risen to the challenge by setting this new record,” JCB Chairman Lord Bamford said.
“It’s an amazing achievement delivered by a young and enthusiastic engineering team. Everyone involved should be very proud of the part they have played in showing off British engineering at its very best.”
Source: Oddity Central