Shepherds pour milk on roads to protest low prices

I want to add more context to this story, the Shepherds are doing this protest because the system is rigged. There is a monopoly on the milk in favour of big companies, these companies buy the milk from the shepherds from a very low price when the market is full and shepherds have a problem selling it ("You can choose, sell the milk for me for 40 cents or sell to no one because no one is going to buy it"). Then after the market wants milk again, the companies sell the milk bought at a low price from the shepherds for a high price to the distributors. Essentially these companies force the shepherds to sell the milk to them for 40 cents/litre, and then they sell it to the customers for 1.5€/litre, nearly 3 times the price.

This posts describes in depth what is happening: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10215501485828857&se...

Translation: "MILK AND NUMBERS The protest explained with the abacus.

The first number is 380 million, it is the liters of sheep's milk that are produced every year in Sardinia. - 1.20 is the price per liter of 3 years ago, multiplied by 380,000,000 liters is equal to 456 million euros - 0.60 is the price per liter of 2019, it means that we have lost 50% of the value! it means that in Sardinia there will be € 228,000,000 of lost earnings, it means 228,000,000 less that will circulate in Sardinia. It is a huge loss of wealth.

- 14,000 are the farms of the island. - 35,000 are the employees. - 100,000 units of the armature. - 365 days are working days for a pastor.

Milk is our gold, its derivatives are inimitable, they have no competition, but pastors suffer, undergo the speculative actions of the great traders and the big industrialists. A short example. those who have enormous financial resources fills the stores when the price collapses. Then the price goes back slowly, also due to the continuous post-sale decrease in stocks of dairies and cooperatives. When there are strong signs of rising and the coop and small industries are ready to sell, the speculators present themselves with their stocks, bought at low prices, put them on the market under quoted prices, and the first ascent is stopped and later it precipitates, for two reasons, for the under-quoted cheese and for market clogging. At this point, who has to empty the cellars is forced to sell off, and also becomes difficult, the market has been clogged. Here he returns, strong of his money, ready to free you from the problem, obviously take or leave.

<< Because throwing milk, it's a waste, it's a food, the fruit of your work, what sense does it have, what do you hope to obtain >> This is what we hear from those who fall from the pearls when they see videos on Facebook. And with more millions of tips, as if we had not tried them all, but it is so, the press does not tell us and people are not aware of the problem, they do not understand the extent of the damage. For this reason I write these lines, to tell, in a very approximate way, the blackmail to which we are subjected, perhaps workers with precarious contracts can understand what it means to live and invest with the uncertainty of tomorrow.

But I want to address especially to you that you have bothered to read these lines and have had the patience to get up here. To you, that from the heat of your apartment, heated and cooled promptly with every change of season, lying on your beautiful sofa, lay the coat to your dog while you nibble a few biscuits just bought at the discount store. Stretch your hand to the smartphone, scroll your wall and do not hold back, you must write and pontificate on our protest, continuing to criticize us yet again because we waste the milk, we recommend to give it to the poor, Caritas, friends etc. .

I want to give you the last numbers of this abacus.

-12,000,000,000 euros, you read well, do not rub your eyes, TWELVE BILLION EUROS, so the waste of food in Italy has been quantified - 47 instead, are the kg of food that every person wastes, every year, in Italy. So dear friend, before criticizing us for the symbolism of our protest I invite you to reflect, it was necessary to throw that apple for that small dent? Was it right to throw away that surplus of pasta you did not eat at lunch? And the half pack of biscuits that were only softened by the air? How much did you give these redundancies to the poor, to Caritas?

We are not perfect but our protest is legitimate. Sorry for the inconvenience, but from now on when you're in the super market and find the pecorino at the same price of potatoes, do not rejoice, somewhere in Sardinia, in some sheep folded in the mountains, there is a shepherd with the face marked by sun and the wind, who cries with his sheep.

Bakis Cavone"