Czech food first: Prague MPs want quotas

Czech supermarket shelves must be filled to 55 percent with domestic products as of next year, according to a parliament ruling that has yet to pass the Senate. That percentage is to increase to at least 73 percent by 2028. Criticism rains down - and not just from the EU. The Czech press is also dumbfounded.

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Lidové noviny (CZ) /

How are we supposed to get a balanced diet?

The plans are utterly far-fetched, Lidové noviny scoffs:

“The ruling would be impossible to implement. The spectrum of agricultural raw materials and the products made from them, in which it is impossible to increase the Czech share to the required quotas, is very high. Only 25 percent of wine can be covered by our own production, for example. Fruit and veg are a whole other chapter. We just don't have the right climate to produce them all year round. The goods we need to ensure a balanced diet would only be available for a few months or even weeks in the year.”

Respekt (CZ) /

Czech Republic under threat as export nation

In Respekt's view, the new legislation makes no sense whatsoever:

“The Czech economy is utterly dependent on export. The planned Czech regulation would encourage Germans, Poles and others to give preference to their own products - and punish Czech exporters with their indifference, which would be the worst part of all this. And why? The far right and the communists are opposed to Czech EU membership and support anything that opposes the basic principles of the union. And the members of parliament in Babiš's ANO party are helping the prime minister, who is the country's largest food producer, by reducing foreign competition.”