Some farmers don't know it themselves, but they can have access to an alternative service… which has been around for fifty years.
In Occitania, these 2,250 flying agents, with sharp and versatile practices, are increasingly in demand.
For sick leave or holidays, they take over.
Nathalie may be a market gardener, but at the moment she only watches her asparagus and summer vegetables grow from afar, during her walks in her small village of Rieumajou, south-east of Toulouse.
She has better things to do since she is on maternity leave.
And she takes care of her little baby “with a free spirit”.
“I know, she says, that things are progressing and that this summer I will have my vegetables to supply my customers”.
Because, rather than burdening the days of her husband, at the head of his own farm, the almost thirty-year-old called on the little-known replacement service for farmers.
"I knew it existed, but I didn't know if we were entitled to it," she recalls.
His agricultural mutual has cleared up his doubts and two competent professionals are leaning forward and transplanting in his place.
Like 2,250 agents in Occitania, these replacements are flying employees.
They take over when the farm manager is on sick leave, maternity leave, paternity leave or quite simply, far from the cliché of the farmer who never leaves his meadow or his animals when he goes on vacation.
“Because they go on vacation and play sports like everyone else, even if few people know it,” jokes Stéphane Minguet, Gers operator and regional president of the famous replacement service.
The organization is not new.
It was created fifty years ago, initially to enable committed farmers to fulfill their union mandates without leaving their farms abandoned.
But it has evolved with social progress, always slower than elsewhere, in this unique profession.
And it has experienced new vigor in recent years.
"It's probably a question of generation, but the use of the service has increased by 25% since 2016", assures the manager.
With peaks at Christmas and in August for the holidays, but enough to occupy 300 “full-time equivalents” year-round.
"I do what I love"
As a result, Sébastien, who this Wednesday is pushing grass “to make balls of straw” in the countryside of Saint-Gaudens, is never bored.
At 43, he has been a replacement agricultural agent for 13 years and very happy to jump from milking cows to working in the fields.
“I was born into a family of farmers.
It was my brother who took over the operation but there was no room for two, he says So, I stay in my branch, I do what I love, he says. he.
And I also have my Sundays and my RTT.
Because we are far from the "farm hand" of yesteryear.
The replacements work an average of 8 hours a day and the missions entrusted to them are located within a radius of 35 kilometers around their home.
"For some young people, it's the best way to get their hands dirty"
“At a time when combine harvesters are self-guided, they also master a whole host of technologies,” emphasizes Stéphane Minguet, half of whose agents are under 35 years old.
"For some young people, it's the best way to practice before settling down," he adds.
"It is certain that in this open world, where we share experiences, it is ideal to rub shoulders with the reality on the ground", abounds the seasoned Sébastien.
At a time when farms no longer house several generations, replacement agents also arrive for reasons that are much less joyful than going skiing or going to the beach.
They sometimes come to bring “respite” to a farmer who is injured, exhausted, or in depression.
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