Criminals approaching farmers to rent barns for drug production

Over one in ten farmers in the nine northern provinces have been approached by criminals in recent years, asking to rent a barn or stable. Almost a third have seen indications of drug crime in their area. And half of the agricultural entrepreneurs experience crime in rural areas as a growing problem, AD reports based on a a survey by the regional agriculture organization LTO-Noord.

For a long time, drug criminals mainly set up drug labs and cannabis plantations in the Noord-Brabant and Zeeland countryside. The LTO-Noord survey indicates that the problem is spreading.

“All farmers must be alert and attentive,” Gaby de Ruiter, a confidential counselor at LTO-Noord and a former police officer, told newspaper AD. “Drug criminals have expanded their area of operation to the northern provinces. No one should be so naive as to think that this cannot happen to them.

Marbel de Graaf, a farmer in Wieringerwerf and chairman of LTO-Noord in Noord-Holland, did not immediately realize what was going on when a man approached her in May last year. “A neat gentleman appeared at the door with a bit of an Italian accent,” she told AD. “He told me that he organized theater productions for children and that he was looking for a space to store a number of pianos.”

“I actually feel like a bit of a fool. Because I even showed him around,” she said. He didn’t appear threatening or intimidating at all. But De Graaf became suspicious when she showed him the shed, and he seemed unconcerned about leaving pianos in the dusty, leaky space. “I eventually asked him politely but firmly to leave.”

According to De Ruiter, many farmers have much more confronting experiences. “I also know situations where four men drive onto the property in a Mercedes, get out, and clearly indicate what they want. Then you have to be very firm as a person to say ‘no.’” She stressed that drug labs can be very dangerous. “The laboratories that are set up are not the safest workplaces. They are often filthy, makeshift, and have a recipe stuck on the kettle. And then you just hope that nothing explodes.”

Despite this, LTO-Noord chairman De Graaf worries that financial problems may tempt farmers to agree. “There are enough livestock farmers in dire straits. Then, a proposal for quick money sounds tempting. But once you say ‘yes,’ you never get rid of it.”

The police are currently going door to door in rural areas for prevention purposes. “We emphasize the dangers of getting involved with criminals,” a police spokesperson said to AD. “The owner of a site where illegal activities take place is an accomplice and therefore punishable. Moreover, they can face intimidation and violence if they no longer want to cooperate with criminal activities.”