In 2016 and 2020 , farmers overwhelmingly supported Donald Trump for president. The track record of his administration justifies the choice, as Trump appointed agency directors who reversed unnecessarily strict Obama-era regulations on chemical crop protection products that are essential for fighting pests and preserving yields. Now, with President Joe Biden nearing the end of his term and having gone back to much […]
I was a guest on Consumer Choice Radio with David Clement, talking Canadian politics and the ramifications of political scandals. You can listen to Consumer Choice Radio weekly on Sauga 960AM in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario, and on Coastal Carolina Network on Saturdays 1-2 PM EST, as well as on all the major podcast players.
In this week’s episode of ConsEUmer: 🇧🇷 What is the future of the EU-Mercosur trade agreement? 🌱 Europe opens shop for the plants of the future (w/ Amrit Nanda) Follow Plants for the Future on Twitter @Plant_ETP. Note: I did say “European Technology *Forum” in the intro. Should have been *Platform. The European Commission video […]
I was a guest on Agriculture of America to talk about Dutch and EU agriculture policy and why it faces pushback.
This week’s episode is aviation-heavy: 💶 The study by T&E on kerosene taxes is just very wrong 🇵🇹 The political scandal surrounding Portugal’s national airline (w/ Jorge Teixeira) (also, the date is June 1st for this episode, not June 2nd as I said in the episode… my bad!) June 1, 2023 Follow ConsEUmer wherever you […]
Is the farm bill a welfare program for slackers or the last-ever chance to create a sustainable food model for the future? Listening to Republicans and Democrats, those seem to be the only two choices. The $1 trillion-plus spending package that is the 2023 farm bill is set to become an unprecedented point of contention […]
The Farmer-Citizen Movement, or BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB), won big in the recent Dutch provincial elections, raking up a whopping 15 of the 75 seats in the Senate. This makes it the strongest party in the Netherlands’ upper chamber, with the ability to undermine the government of Prime Minister Mark Rutte. The BBB was created in 2019, […]
The United States has the opportunity to upgrade its food exports to increase revenues for farmers, but for that to happen it needs to negotiate a comprehensive trade deal with Europe. For reference, America exports more food to Japan, a market of 125 million consumers, than to the European Union, which holds (with its associated […]
According to the Wall Street Journal, tech giant Amazon may soon face an antitrust lawsuit by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Amazon has, for years, faced criticism for its business model which is seen by regulators and (some) politicians as “anticompetitive” – whether it is the accusation of preferencing its own products in its online store, […]
When the European Commission (the EU’s executive arm) unveiled the “Farm to Fork” (often referred to as F2F) strategy in May 2020, the repercussions of the years to come were unknown. Brussels laid out an ambitious roadmap for agricultural reform: reducing land use, severe cuts in synthetic crop protection, reduction in synthetic fertilizers and boosting […]
Bill Wirtz 