A farmer spreading phytosanitary products on his crops. - ALLILI MOURAD / SIPA

Herbicides, fungicides, insecticides ... In France in 2018, the purchase of phytosanitary products increased sharply in agriculture, despite controversies and two successive government plans whose objective was, however, to reduce their use. A "cyclical effect" which annoys the defenders of the environment.

"After a slight decrease in 2017, the committee noted a strong overall increase (+ 21%) in the quantities sold of plant protection products in 2018," the four ministries of Agriculture and Health said in a statement Tuesday evening. of Research and Ecological Transition. Earlier in the day, the association of producers and sellers of phytosanitary products (UIPP) had indicated in another press release that sales of plant protection products to distributors had increased by 8% in 2018, to 68,000 tonnes.

A "cyclical" effect

"We believe that the 8% increase in the quantity of substances sold compared to 2017 is due to a cyclical effect", the storage of products by farmers at the end of 2018 to anticipate the increase in the fee for diffuse pollution (RPD) entered in force on January 1, 2019, Eugénia Pommaret, director general of the UIPP, told AFP. This phenomenon had already been observed during previous increases in RPD in 2008 and 2015, she added.

The explanation is the same at government level: "this development seems to be linked to an anticipation of purchases at the end of 2018 in anticipation of the increase in the RPD", ensures the interministerial press release. "The policy pursued for 10 years is not producing the expected results", observed in a tweet the Minister for the Ecological and Inclusive Transition Elisabeth Borne. "We need to give it a new lease of life because we have no choice but to move towards a society less dependent on phytosanitary products," she added.

“Failure” of the government's plan

"We don't understand anything anymore," commented Eric Thirouin, FNSEA deputy secretary general, to AFP, about the difference between the figures given by professionals and those of the government. "We see that agricultural practices have evolved" and that progress "is very real". He therefore requests that the indicators be "overhauled".

"I think we can not attribute such an increase simply to the stocks that were made before the introduction of an increase," for his part told AFP François Veillerette, director of the association Generations Futures. In a press release, the environmental organization denounces “this considerable increase in the dependence of our agriculture on pesticides which marks the total failure of this Ecophyto plan! It is now obvious that this plan will remain a failure as long as the State relies on the goodwill of the agricultural profession to voluntarily change its practices! ".

Significant decline over 20 years

"While these figures should call for a deep questioning and a historic jump, the government remains sluggish" reacted for its part the Nicolas Hulot Foundation, which "calls on the government and parliamentarians to pull themselves together to give a clear direction to farmers and protect the environment and citizens ”.

Despite these increases revealed on Tuesday, in 20 years, the quantities of active ingredients used have fallen by "more than 40%", going from around 120,000 tonnes purchased by distributors in 1999 to 68,000 tonnes in 2018, according to figures from the UIPP. In these figures, good news stands out all the same: the UIPP notes "a constant increase in the share of biocontrol products (more environmentally friendly solutions) in volume", increased from 13.4% in 2010 to 23.7% in 2017, according to figures from the DGAL (Directorate General for Food, which reports to the Ministry of Agriculture).

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