All rightwing fascists are basically the same, it is exhaustingly monotone.

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[–] 11 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Depends on what we deem favorable. French (and actually all EU farmers) are highly dependend on subsidies by the EU. Otherwise they couldn't compete globally and/or stand the price war from the retailers. Ukraine in the market would most probably mean lower consumer prices (due to further improved supply) while further stressing farmers. On the onther hand with farmers already dependend on subsidies I don't see why this couldn't be countered.

What also bothers me is that the far-right usually has a libertarian economic point of view which in the last resort is the reason for the miserable situation of dmall farmers... however now and then they pretend to care about them, just like the conservatives do.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    I actually doubt it would meaningfully reduce food prices for regular consumers. Ukraine mostly produces bulk grain. The price of bread wheat hovers around 20-25 eurocent per kilo. When you buy bread in the store the cost of the wheat is a miniscule part of the price. The real money in the food network is not in farming food but in processing it and running grocery stores selling it. Wheat can easily triple in value just by grinding it to flour and putting it in a paper bag. The value of barley goes up over 1000% when brewed into beer. If we let Ukraine in maybe we can reduce the price of some grains and bulk sunflower seed by a couple eurocents which will make pretty much no difference at all for the consumer but it will reduce the profits of our EU grain farmers by double digit procentage points.

    Can we counteract this with even more agricultural subsidies? Of course we can. But that's a cost that has to be planned for. The alternative is letting the least profitable farmers to go bust, leading to only mega farms remaining. Which is either a good thing or a bad thing depending on your perspective. Worth noting is that in Ukraine there are almost only mega farms already because of the Soviet farm collectivisation heritage. That's part of the reason they can produce grain so efficiently and cheaply, in combination with them having some of the most fertile soils on earth.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 day ago* (1 child)

    And those bankrupt farmers won't just lie down and take it. They'll vote for whoever goes against that before or after it happens. That'll also be a part of the cost.

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  • [–] 1 point 20 hours ago

    @avidamoeba@lemmy.ca

    This has nothing to do with French farmers. Le Pen has a strong history of lenient positions toward authoritarian regimes, particularly China and probably more so toward Russia.

    Though she sometimes appears to have a critical stance towards China, it is mainly rhetorical. In 2025, for example, her party was the only party to oppose a national resolution to impose a €2 levy on small packages, which primarily targeted the flood of Shein and Temu packages in France.

    Her stance toward Russia is explicitly pro-Kremlin. Before the invasion of Ukraine, she notoriously defended closer ties with Putin’s regime and even publicly justified the annexation of Crimea. It's for such comments that a 2023 French parliamentary report says that Le Pen’s far right serves as mouthpiece for the Kremlin.

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