-Caveat Lector-
... farm uprising?
>From Irish Times
> Tuesday, August 24, 1999
>
> French farmers stampede
> against McDonald's beef
>
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> ------- By Lara Marlowe
>
> <Picture>PARIS LETTER: Perhaps Ronald McDonald guessed he was
> symbolising the world's biggest restaurant chain when the first
> golden arches rose in California in 1955. It is less likely that
> Mr McDonald imagined he would become a symbol of "American
> imperialism" and the favourite target of angry French farmers.
>
> Until this summer, the US chain could complain of little more
> than a few kidnapped clown statues in the country that inven ted
> cuisine, but in late July, Washington announced it would levy 100
> per cent tariffs on French Roquefort cheese, Dijon mustard and
> truffles, along with several other European products, until the
> EU agreed to import US hormone-treated beef.
>
> Since then, at least seven demonstrations have been staged at
> McDonald's restaurants across France, including three last
> Saturday, when tonnes of manure and rotten fruit were dumped
> beneath the ubiquitous arches.
>
> In the most violent incident, on August 12th, farmers from the
> Peasant Confederation and the Syndicate of Ewe Milk Producers
> (who make Roquefort) destroyed an unfinished McDonald's at Mil
> lau, in the southern French department of Aveyron. The farmers
> spray-painted "McDo Go Home" on the walls, tore down half the
> structure and hauled away building materials and equipment on
> trailers.
>
> On the same day, in Antwerp, the Animal Liberation Front set fire
> to another McDonald's, denouncing the company for "filling their
> pockets with money from illtreated cows".
>
> Four of the ringleaders of the Millau attack were freed on bail
> last Friday, but the fifth, Mr Jos eph (José) Bové, is still in
> prison near Montpellier after turning himself in on August 19th.
> With smiling eyes and a long grey moustache, Mr Bové (46) is the
> farmers' Don Quixote, attacking the big food multi-nationals whom
> he blames for destroying French peasant life.
>
> Since 1976, Mr Bové, his wife and two daughters have lived
> without water or electricity in an abandoned sheep, cattle and
> pig farm on the Larzac plateau. Last February, he received an
> eightmonth suspended sentence for destroying genetically modified
> corn seeds at the Novartis plant near Agen. In June, e he
> attacked experimental genetically modified rice paddies in
> Montpellier.
>
> The arrest of the "McDonald's five" created some odd affinities
> among French politicians. The Green Party, which participates in
> the left-wing French government, said the vandalism at Millau was
> justified because of "the strategy of the United States which
> wants to force Europeans to eat hormone meat they don't want".
>
> Mr Bruno Mégret, leader of the breakaway faction of the extreme
> right-wing National Front, demanded their "immediate liberation"
> because "French people who denounce the American reprisals
> against our home-grown products are not dangerous terrorists but
> real resistants to the New World Order".
>
> The majority of the demonstrations have been peaceful. In Cahors,
> farmers stood outside Mc Donald's to give away foie gras and
> local wine as an alternative to junk food. Even the good-natured
> protests however convey a profound sense of unease which has
> merely found a focus in the hormone beef dispute. The overwhel
> ming power of agri-business and wholesale distributors and the
> catch-all culprit "globalisation" are at the centre of the
> farmers' anxieties.
>
> On a more immediate level, prices for fruit and vegetable crops
> have fallen and a doubleticketing scheme, intended to show
> consumers how big a markup the distributors are taking, has not
> calmed the farmers' anger. Milk producers are scheduled to join
> the movement today to protest against a 5 centime fall in price.
>
> All see the World Trade Organisation as a "tool of American
> imperialism" because it approved the punitive sanctions over
> hormone beef. Militant French groups say they believe the WTO
> will soon allow the US to export products made from genetically
> modified food without this being indicated on the label. Another
> round of WTO trade negotiations are scheduled for Seattle this
> autumn, and the French Peasant Confederation is busy organising a
> protest rally on September 23rd. The director of McDonald's 750
> restaurants in France told Le Figaro that his company has been
> "sandwiched (sic) between two monsters" - the US and the EU - and
> the chain keeps 45,000 French beef producers employed.
>
> "Anti-Americanism is a part of French culture, Le Figaro
> concluded in a front-page editorial; the battle between Roquefort
> and hamburger is but "a symbol of our fin de siècle".
A<>E<>R
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