Jean Castex, July 29, 2020 at the Elysée. - AFP

New trip for Jean Castex, who is going this time to the Cher to the winegrowers, in crisis after the Covid-19 epidemic. The Prime Minister must announce a strengthening of financial aid in favor of the sector, pending a gesture at harvest time.

The Prime Minister, accompanied by the Minister of Agriculture Julien Denormandie, must first visit an organic farm in Menetou-Salon, north-east of Bourges, before going to the Sancerre wine house, to meet local professionals. He must express himself there at midday. While the government, at the time headed by Edouard Philippe, had granted in May an initial envelope of 170 million euros to the sector, its representatives hope for an additional boost.

A significant shortfall

"Overall, the food industry has been less impacted than others by the Covid (...) but this hides significant differences depending on the sector", explains Matignon, stressing that viticulture, "dependent on catering" and subject to a recovery of “heterogeneous” tourist activity is among the most affected.

At the same time, "there has also been a fairly strong contraction in trade", while France "exports between 30 and 40% of its production", points out Matignon. In total, wine growers estimate that the health crisis has created a shortfall of at least 1.5 billion euros due to the shutdown of bars, restaurants, festive gatherings and tourism.

Double the aid

And to the coronavirus crisis is added the effect of the American sanctions pronounced at the end of 2019 on wines of less than 14 degrees (excluding sparkling wines), in retaliation for a trade dispute between Airbus and Boeing. "We can not leave an economic sector that brings so much to the French trade balance by the side of the road", pleads Jérôme Despey, secretary general of the FNSEA and winegrower in the Hérault. According to him, the French wine industry needs to double the aid granted so far (European and national) to deal with the crisis.

"While the harvest is already starting in some regions, we have estimated the total needs of the sector at more than 350 million euros to finance the necessary distillations and the private storage of wines" he told Tuesday. AFP. However, the plan announced in May included 155 million aid for distillation and 15 million aid for the storage of surpluses.

Towards an “additional effort” from the government?

The distillation system, authorized by Brussels and financed with European funds, subsidizes the transformation of unsold wines into alcohol which will be used in the manufacture of bioethanol, perfumes or hydroalcoholic gel. The envelope released today makes it possible to transform around two million hectoliters. The winegrowers ask for enough to distill 3 to 3.5 million hectoliters to make room for the next harvest.

"We are working on an additional effort," Julien Denormandie said last week, before the Economic Affairs Committee of the National Assembly. Representatives of wine growers also urge the government to expand the number of businesses eligible for social security contribution exemptions, allowing them to benefit from it from the moment they have lost at least 60% of their turnover during the period. confinement, against a threshold of 80% currently.

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