2024-01-07 10:12 update: 2024-01-09, 21:24
Fot. PAP/Darek Delmanowicz
The Polish agriculture minister and farmers blocking the border crossing with Ukraine at Medyka, south-eastern Poland, have signed an agreement under which their protest at the frontier has been suspended.
The agreement was signed on Saturday by Minister Czeslaw Siekierski, Teresa Kubas-Hul, the Podkarpackie province governor, and Roman Kondrow, the leader of the 'Deceived Countryside' organisation.
The farmers, who started blocking the Medyka border crossing on November 23, demanded subsidies for corn, additional money for liquidity loans and maintaining the current level of agricultural tax throughout next year. They had suspended their protest on December 24 for the holiday period but decided to relaunch it on January 4.
Under the signed agreement, the agriculture minister has obliged himself to implement the three postulates demanded by the protesting farmers, including a PLN 1 billion (EUR 232.6 million) subsidy for corn, an increase in agricultural lending by PLN 2.5 billion (EUR 581.4 million), and no increase in the agricultural tax.
"The postulates will be implemented after the legislation process has ended and after they have been approved by the European Commission," the governor told a briefing on Saturday.
Siekierski said that the signed agreement "is neither the beginning nor the end of dialogue which we have started with farmers and which we will continue."
"We want to solve problems in dialogue and partner-like discussion," he said.
Having referred to the situation in Ukraine, Siekierski said that his government understood well that it was necessary to offer aid to that country, but at the same time, it wanted some quota regulations which would define the amount of goods that could enter the European market.
"The EU must support Ukraine in its exports, but on a global scale, where it is needed," he said.
Polish truckers have also been blocking the border crossings with Ukraine since November last year, complaining about unfair competition from their Ukrainian peers. (PAP)
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