The French government pledged to increase aid for agriculture on Thursday, after thousands of farmers converged on Paris and blocked the city’s streets with more than 1,500 tractors to protest against high costs and low prices, reports The Wall Street Journal.
French prime minister Manuel Valls announced a series of new measures he said would free up to 3 billion euros ($3.33 billion) for farmers to invest in modernizing production over the next three years.
The government pledged to subsidize loans, cut social-security charges, delay tax bills and simplify agricultural regulation. It also proposed that the state and banks delay loan repayments due in 2015.
“France won’t let its farmers down,” Mr. Valls said, after a meeting with representatives from France’s FNSEA federation of farming unions and the young-farmers lobby Jeunes Agriculteurs.
Though the share of agriculture in the French economy has sunk to below 2% from around 21% after World War II, farming is considered key to France’s identity, so governments regularly yield to farmers’ demands.
The rally in Paris was the latest in months of protests and marked the first time farmers had taken the fight into the government’s backyard.