Christos Gkikas joined a protest held at midday by livestock farmers outside the political office of Deputy Minister of Rural Development Christos Kellas in Larissa. Speaking to reporters, he said that farmers whose animals were killed are left without any way to survive.

‘We are unemployed, our animals were killed,’ Gkikas said. ‘I understand that, but they threw us out on the street without giving us any income to live on. I’ll stay on a hunger strike until the last livestock farmer who killed his animals is given at least €1,000 a month to support their family, until we bring our animals back. For everything else, all livestock farmers will fight together.

‘I am on a hunger strike because there are livestock farmers who currently do not have the money to feed their children, send them to university, pay rent, electricity, water.’

Gkikas said he had not initially intended to take such a step. The decision came, he explained, after Kellas’s associates refused to allow a five-member committee of livestock farmers to enter the office and deliver a memorandum of demands, insisting that only three people could be received.

The farmers rejected this, saying they did not want specific individuals to be singled out and targeted. They asked instead for the deputy minister’s associates to come down and meet them. When this was refused, tensions escalated and Gkikas announced that he would begin a hunger strike.

Although the minister’s associates later met Gkikas outside the office and informed him that a meeting would be arranged with the deputy minister, he refused and has remained at the scene, insisting on his decision.

On Thursday 13 November, a rally was held outside Kellas’s political office in Larissa by livestock farmers from across Thessaly. They protested against the handling of sheep pox, which has devastated herds across the country, as well as the suspension of payments by OPEKEPE, the state agency responsible for managing and disbursing EU agricultural subsidies.

Farmers at the rally demanded compensation so that they could rebuild their herds, stressing: ‘We are not just asking for money, we want to replace the animals that were killed.’ They had requested a meeting with the deputy minister or the head of his office to present their demands, which ultimately did not take place.

Earlier, protesters had arrived at the site in a motorcade and march that started from the centre of Larissa.

In a symbolic act of protest, they poured milk on the ground at the gathering point and held a sit-in. In a statement posted by the Pan-Provincial Agricultural and Livestock Association of Elassona, they declared: ‘We want our sheep back so we can work,’ calling for income support, vaccinations and replacement of the animals that were killed because of the zoonosis.

At the same time, a new mobilisation is planned in Thessaly for Friday 14 November, with tractors and agricultural machinery, this time in Agia Larissa. Agricultural associations and cooperatives denounce ‘the continued mockery and abandonment by the government and the Ministry of Rural Development’, arguing that delays in OPEKEPE payments have financially exhausted producers.

They also emphasise that livestock farmers have not received any substantial financial support and are unable to replace the animals they lost or continue production.

At the same time, they report that while the agricultural sector is struggling to survive, there is an attempt to exclude cherries from compensation provided by ELGA, the state agricultural insurance organisation that pays out for crop damage, so that they can instead be included in some unclear financial programme.

They recall that the April frost caused serious damage to a large part of production. Peaches, nectarines, cherries, almonds, plums, pears and apricots were affected at the flowering stage, apples at the pre-flowering stage, while chestnuts lost their commercial value because of dry, hot conditions and water scarcity.

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