Paris (AFP)
State Secretary for Transition Ecology Emmanuelle Wargon said Sunday that the government's decision on the distance of pesticide application compared to homes would be announced "by the end of December".
"As for the pesticide order, we will make a decision by the end of December, based on what we have put in consultation, so it's too early to tell you the decision. the government has taken, "Wargon told franceinfo.
The Minister of Agriculture Didier Guillaume had mentioned mid-November an announcement "early December".
"When we put in consultation, we said between three, five and ten meters and so we will probably be in this order of magnitude for the so-called zones of non-treatment" between homes and cultures, recalled Mrs. Wargon .
The government is considering a distance of "10 meters for high crops and 5 meters for low crops" with a decree that "will provide cases based on local consultation", according to Mr. Guillaume.
"If you have to go 20 meters in some places, you will have 20 meters in some places" and "if there is a consultation that reaches 100 meters, it will be 100 meters," he said.
The public consultation on the minimum distances between homes and pesticide application areas, launched in early September, had lasted a month, collecting more than 50,000 opinions.
The project is denounced by environmentalists who consider protective measures too weak and by dozens of mayors of rural or urban municipalities who have taken anti-pesticide orders challenged in court by the state.
© 2019 AFP