Rennes (AFP)

Audincourt, Revest-des-Brousses, Val-de-Reuil ... Anxious to "protect" their citizens, mayors of all political spheres multiply anti-pesticide orders across the Hexagon, after the suspension of high-profile that of the mayor of Langouët, in Brittany.

"Every day, a mayor makes a new order, and as far as I know, we've been over 30 in France," says Daniel Cueff, mayor of Langouët (Ille-et-Vilaine). "Some even call me to ask if my order is free of rights."

On May 18, Mr. Cueff issued an order banning the use of plant protection products "at a distance of less than 150 meters from any cadastral parcel comprising a building used for residential or professional purposes". This text was suspended Tuesday by the administrative court of Rennes, seized by the prefect of Ille-et-Vilaine, on the grounds that a mayor is not competent to take decisions on the use of pesticides.

"What infuriates the mayors is that the government is doing nothing and is also preventing mayors from taking action to protect the inhabitants," said Cueff, who said he received 47,000 messages of support and a Nicolas Hulot's call.

"We support the mayor of Langouët, we must stand together," said AFP Brigitte Moya, mayor of Aubenas-les-Alpes (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence), who took a decree in August . In the same department, Brigitte Reynaud, mayor of Revest-des-Brousses, acted identically. "It's up to us to push for agricultural practices to change," she says.

Marc-Antoine Jamet, PS mayor of Val-de-Reuil, municipality of 16,000 inhabitants in the Eure, has taken a decree to ban pesticides within 150 meters of the public road, the same day Langouët was suspended. "I am looking for an electroshock, a ripple effect, a mass effect" face "to the problem of pesticides" and face "the urgency and the importance of the dangers that threaten the planet", he said Explain.

"No need to pretend, there is a poisoning of land, water and air and that is what explains the disappearance of insects birds," added the mayor. "At no time is it a hostile gesture to farmers for whom I have admiration, maybe it's a way to help them."

- "Cry alert" -

The mayor of Sceaux UI (Hauts-de-Seine), Philippe Laurent, Secretary General of the Association of Mayors of France, who also signed an order, defends "a way to put the debate on the public square" while the population is "90% in favor of the ban, even more."

"This is not a sword in the water, it should not be a punctual thing.This is why so many mayors have made this type of orders," says -he.

In the Somme, the mayor (various right) of Saint-Maulvis, Jean-Philippe Bauden has done the same "to react" farmers. "We know that it is very dangerous their products", justifies the town of this town of 287 inhabitants.

In the Doubs, in Boussières, the mayor without label Bertrand Astric has totally forbidden the glyphosate on all the territory of the commune. "Mayors take things in hand because the state does not do it," he says. "It's a warning cry, I'm an amateur beekeeper, I see bee colonies collapse, biodiversity collapse."

Challenged by the prefectures, all these orders should give rise to legal remedies.

Thursday, the Minister of Agriculture Didier Guillaume promised that the state would impose "non-treatment zones", so riparian, elected and farmers could not agree to jointly establish territorial "charters" spreading. He mentioned an area of ​​"two" to "five" meters around the houses.

In June, the State Council had partly annulled an interministerial decree regulating the use of pesticides, believing that it did not protect the health of residents and the environment sufficiently.

burs-aag / GVY / shu

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