Farmer protest AD 2024

#Bauernproteste in 2024 refers to on-line representation of a series of farmers (but not only)  protests that took place across Germany 8-15.01.2024. The protests were primarily against the planned agricultural cuts by the German government, including the removal of tax advantages for agricultural diesel, however in the course preparation in 2023/2024 of ​​​​the range of postulates were extended.

Here we analyze in statu nastendi the animal part of the protest. The Green Deal and From Field to Fork EU flagship projects expected considerable impact on livestock production fostered the formation of alliances between animal breeders, far-right groups, agricultural parties, and religious organizations, all of whom share a common interest in opposing policies[1]. The growing divide in politics in relation to the animal agriculture sector has resulted in intensified protests that seem to have no end in sight, being one of the most important common triggers of conflicts in the contemporary EU[2]. 

We have applied quantitative methods to assess German digital traditional social am new media in September 2023. We collected mentions [3] related to the protests (01-15.01.2024) by Brand24 (4082 traditional and social media posts with #Bauernproteste) and EventRegistry (20971 news articles related to animal protest) as supply of information). Additionally queries related to farmer protest in Google (demand of information) were incorporated for triangulation rule to be applied.   

Only 5% (1058) of news articles (by EventRegistry) contain animal related content. In the great majority, animal issues are marginal of the main topic of the article. Among the most relevant keywords and phrases are milk and meat product prices/costs of production. 

Around 17% (701) of mentions (by Brand24) contain animal related content. There is high intensity visual content (infographics, photos and videos). #Tiere is often used to annotate TikTok videos. Outside of issue of animal product prices, we see some memes/infographic with animals to be used in protests as well as discourse on blocking Ukrainian animal feed and animal products,

As in supply of information, Google queries of animal issues did not show up significantly during the protests. We can see some (of secondary importance) collocation of protest queries with questions of CO2 emission by animal production and there is a slight increase in the interest in animal products. 

Nitrogen emission or animal welfare topics which triggered other big European protests last  year were not well exposed in none of the selected materials.

In Conclusion, veterinary issues are totally neglected by agenda setting mechanisms during the protest, probably because there is no interest in this aspect (as we see no change in trend in Google which shows what the general public think of). On the other hand farmers used animal topics from their perspective, however mainly as a secondary argument or as a symbol of farming. Thus, media monitoring [4] activity during such kinds of events is an important part of veterinary public health scope.

Literature

[1] A. Jarynowski, A. Semenov, D. Platek, M. Wójta-Kempa, and V. Belik, ‘Animal breeders Protests in Polish Twitter-preliminary research’, 2022, [Online]. Available: http://interdisciplinary-research.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/animal_related_protests_in_twitter_preprint_pdf.pdf

[2] A. Jarynowski, ‘Agroterrorism involving biological agents and related threats in Poland and Europe in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine’, Terroryzm, no. 4 (4), pp. 405–444, Sep. 2023, doi: 10.4467/27204383TER.23.032.18334.

[3] J. Oelke, A. Jarynowski, and V. Belik, ‘The curious case of the lion from Berlin in summer’ 23: how Internet media shapes risk perception from wildlife-human conflict’, E-Methodol., vol. 9, no. 9, pp. 127–136, Nov. 2023, doi: 10.15503/emet.2022.127.136.

[4] M. Pappaioanou and T. R. Kane, ‘Addressing the urgent health challenges of climate change and ecosystem degradation from a One Health perspective: what can veterinarians contribute?’, J. Am. Vet. Med. Assoc., pp. 1–7, Nov. 2022, doi: 10.2460/javma.22.07.0315.