New EU rules could see a vital ingredient in paella being banned in another blow for European farmers.
Farmers in Spain have slammed the European Commission for banning a vital pesticide called tricyclazole.
Producers said the pesticide is needed to protect the harvest of bomba rice, a key ingredient in paella, from a fungus which causes rice blast disease.
The rice is famed for how it swells when used in paella, in which it is traditionally cooked with chicken, rabbit and beans.
Farmer in the Albufera Natural Park Miguel Minguet has slammed the EU
Reuters
Miguel Minguet, a farmer in the Albufera Natural Park said: "[Bomba rice] is very likely to disappear...Our crop is going to be lost to regulations."
Three producers from Valencia said their harvest of the rice was half the 10-year average in 2023 because of the Pyricularia fungus.
The decline in bomba rice production has caused the price to double in three years, now selling for more than £4 per kilo.
However, after the EU ruled in 2018 the chemical could be harmful to human health.
But farmers said it had been relied upon for 40 years to combat the fungus affecting bomba rice in Spain’s wetlands.
Tractor protests have erupted in Spain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy against the bloc’s net zero plans and green laws.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
Paella rice is a key source of income for many Spanish farmers
Reuters
Earlier this week, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen proposed withdrawing the EU’s plan to halve the use of pesticides, calling it a "symbol of polarisation."
Speaking to the European Parliament, she said: "Our farmers deserve to be listened to. I know that they are worried about the future of agriculture and their future as farmers.
"But they also know that agriculture needs to move to a more sustainable model of production so that their farms remain profitable in the years to come."
Major exporters such as Brazil, India and Cambodia are widely using the pesticide to protect their own crops and the EU still allows imports to have small traces of the fungicide.
Farmers slow down traffic with their tractors on the A-15 motorway in Spain
Reuters
Meanwhile, the Italian government said the EU's war on pesticide is a "war on farmers."
Nicola Procaccini, a member of PM Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party, lashed out at the "madness" of the EU’s net zero plans in a speech to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday.
He said: "You have crushed farmers and promoted the consumption of insects and larvae."
The Times reports that protein-rich insects, which are eaten by an estimated two billion people on a regular basis, need much less land and water and are seen as a low-carbon alternative to meat.