When protesters show up at the capital driving tractors, politicians need to listen.

That lesson has been learned time and again in Oregon, Washington, California and the rest of the U.S. Most recently, it was demonstrated in Germany, where $920 million in agricultural subsidies were taken from farmers.

A constitutional court had ruled that Germany was illegally borrowing money to pay for its climate change programs. The ruling blew an $18 billion hole in Germany’s budget.

The government tried to balance the budget by canceling any expenses vaguely related to climate change. That included farmers’ tax breaks for farm equipment and diesel fuel.

After farmers protested, Germany’s coalition government now plans to phase in the changes over several years instead of all at once.

But Germany’s farmers say the government didn’t go far enough. They depend on the tax breaks to produce affordable food and plan to keep protesting and driving their tractors to the capital in Berlin.

The German Farmers’ Association says it wants all of the tax breaks back.

“Our position is unchanged: Both proposed cuts must be taken off the table,” the association’s chairman told The Associated Press.

The farmers will ultimately get what they want. While Germany and other nations continue to wrestle with self-imposed rules aimed at slowing climate change, farmers continue to feed them.

The stakes are huge. Germany’s population is about 83 million. Assuming that Germans eat three times a day, that means farmers produce more that 240 million meals daily. That’s 87.6 billion meals a year, give or take a schnitzel or two.

Politicians do not grow food. Nor do bureaucrats. Farmers do.

Considering that, all of them would do well to find ways to help farmers produce healthful, plentiful and affordable food. While they may think addressing climate change is a top priority, it is not nearly as important as feeding people.

German farmers are not alone. In countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Spain, farmers have taken to the streets to protest a variety of issues. They range from government policies that have put farms out of business to the lack of irrigation water to climate change goals, many of which target agriculture.

For example, the European Union has mandated a 50% reduction in the use of chemical pesticides by 2030. This is part of the EU’s plan to reach “net zero” greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

Another goal is to reduce animal agriculture across the continent. Five years ago in the Netherlands, an advisory committee came up with a doozy of a plan to reduce nitrogen emissions. The government would buy and shut down livestock farms, even though farmers have already reduced their nitrogen emissions by nearly two-thirds.

The resulting farmer protests are still resonating across the continent.

Politicians in that nation and across Europe have been learning the hard way that they do not feed their constituents.

Farmers do.

As long as that’s the case, politicians would do well to stay out of the way.