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LEOPOLDSDORF. Sugar group Agrana stated last week in no uncertain terms: the Leopoldsdorf sugar factory will only exist if Austrian farmers grow 38,000 hectares of sugar beets. There were 26,000 this year, climate change, the beetle weevil, the new phytosanitary ordinance and the fall in sugar prices are the main reasons for the crisis in agriculture.
A hastily placed beet cap is supposed to save national sugar production. The Minister of Agriculture, Elisabeth Köstinger, presented a package of measures, among other things, yield losses must be compensated, emergency approvals in plant protection must be verified with monitoring of bees and research must be intensified.
Of course not to Mercosur
“The liberalization of the markets has caused a drop in prices. This would solidify with the Mercosur free trade agreement and would lead further down. That is why Elisabeth Köstinger again spoke out clearly against Mercosur at the summit and confirmed the no of the government, “he says in a broadcast from the farmers’ union.
Self-sufficiency guarantees sovereignty
“The Leopoldsdorf location is not only decisive for planning safety for the 4,500 beet growers, it is also a workplace for 150 employees and a guarantee of self-sufficiency. For all this to continue, a national show of force is now required, ”said the director of the Lower Austrian Farmers Association, Paul Nemecek.
“We are clearly behind the Austrian sugar and beet growers. The summit is pointing in the right direction ”, LH MP Stephan Pernkopf and Johannes Schmuckenschlager, President of the Lower Austrian Chamber of Agriculture, welcome the package of measures by Agriculture Minister Elisabeth Köstinger.
Rescue the sugar factory
The proposed solutions are intended to counter the imminent closure of the Leopoldsdorf sugar factory. “First of all, it’s about ensuring self-sufficiency with high-quality domestic sugar, as well as securing the location at the Leopoldsdorf sugar factory,” says Pernkopf.
Sugar from “somewhere”
“If sugar is not produced in Austria, it comes from somewhere where it is produced under conditions that we do not know about,” agree Pernkopf and Schmuckschllager on the consequences of a closure. What pesticides are used there is more than questionable. If the sugar factory closes, regional added value and jobs are lost.
