Beginning Oct. 18, truckers and farmers came together, blockading roads, ports and fuel depots across southern Italy to protest the soaring cost of diesel and its devastating impact on their livelihoods. They’ve won widespread support from working people across the country.
“At the end of the month, with our costs, we can’t live like this. We can’t work like this,” trucker Salvatore Esposito told the New York Times in Naples. The cost of diesel has risen 32% since February.
“We cultivate land, we harvest debt,” read a banner at a farmers’ protest in Gela, Sicily. Fishermen who work along Italy’s Adriatic coast joined the protests Oct. 21, with fuel now estimated to eat up 60% of their total operating costs.
Above, farmers protest high fuel prices in Gela Oct. 3. Sign reads, “It is always families and those who work the fields who pay the price.”
The truckers’ successful blockade forced auto bosses at Stellantis to shut down production at several of its plants as they’ve run out of parts.
Carmela Apetino told the Times that her family owned a pizzeria in Naples that was running out of yeast and cheese, but she didn’t mind because she supported the protests. “Someone’s quiet, quiet, and then he can’t be anymore,” she said. “I think it was time for an earthquake.”
Ciro Testa, who is unemployed, told the Times he was worried he’d run out of fuel for his car. “I’m praying to Padre Pio,” he said. “But pay attention — I’m praying that the government folds, not the truckers.”
Deli owner Gennaro Lubrano said he still had some goods on his shelves, “But we will run out. And when we do, we’ll go protest with the truckers.”
The government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced Oct. 22 it would dispense nearly $200 million worth of subsidies to truckers, farmers and fishermen hit by the rising prices. “It’s not enough,” Esposito said.
The blockades in Italy are part of a wave of protests spreading across Europe in recent weeks against moves by the bosses and their governments to dump ever more of the capitalist crisis onto the backs of working people. Demonstrations by unions, students and others have shaken politics in Albania, France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain.