Agriculture fair: a feeling of agribashing in the air

In the aisles of the 57th Agricultural Show, there is a funny atmosphere. Nothing to do with the smell of cow dung and pig manure. Rather an impression of unease which embraces the farmers as soon as one takes a few minutes to approach them. A feeling of bashing, a climate of suspicion hovering over the agricultural world which recently bears a name: "agribashing".

"Tensions are felt on animal husbandry and animal welfare, on agriculture and the use of pesticides. I will not tolerate any violence against farmers," warned Emmanuel Macron, the day before his visit to the Porte de Versailles, to anyone who tries to make a hiccup. For more than two years or so, citizens or environmental associations convinced of the urgency of a change in method have directly attacked farmers to denounce what they consider as excessive use of pesticides or conditions of treatment unworthy of animals.

"We are no longer serene"

Presidential injunctions do nothing. Agribashing seems to have spread in the French countryside like manure in a field. "The attacks have become recurrent in our profession, laments Sébastien Brishoual, at the head of a farm of 300 sows and 265 hectares of agricultural land, in Quimperlé, in Brittany. When it is not on social networks, One of my employees was recently attacked on the ground by passers-by who had ordered him to stop treating. He may have explained to them that he was spreading liquid fertilizer on his fields, that it was nothing harmful, the walkers did not want to hear anything. There is a tension in the countryside, we are always obliged to justify ourselves. We are no longer serene . "

Same sound of the bell a few tens of meters further. "Agribashing is in the era of time, notes Stéphane Hirtzberger, sheep breeder for 15 years, in Haute-Marne. As if we did not take care of our working tool, that are the soil and animals", lets go the disillusioned farmer.

Organic farming is no exception. "One of my employees was hit with a helmet by a cyclist while he was treating with Bordeaux mixture," says Pierre Sylva, 28-year-old organic apple and plant producer in Lot-et-Garonne. Yes , this natural treatment contains copper, but it represents 500 grams over forty hectares, it does not mean anything. Even at the show, we are regularly told that organic does not exist, that we still pollute ... "

"You have to believe that in communication, we are not good"

According to farmers, the bashing begins on social networks, in the press and ends on the farms in the form of anonymous letters, insults, physical attacks or trespassing on farms to film the animals or break equipment. A phenomenon that has become such that since October 2019, the Ministry of Agriculture has set up the Demeter national unit. A device responding to the sweet name of the ancient goddess of harvests to account for attacks perpetrated on actors in the agricultural world. Since its launch, it has recorded around forty attacks per day in the French agricultural sector.

For its 57th edition, the Agricultural Show therefore plays the card of openness. With the theme "agriculture reaches out to you", the agricultural world displays its desire for transparency and dialogue, to explain to the general public their practices. "We come as much to the show for commercial reasons as for our image", explains the sheep breeder. We must believe that in communication, we are not good. Yet progress is there, agriculture has never been cleaner in the past decade. "

Everyone then tries to explain the new virtuous methods applied to their exploitation. Sébastien Brishoual favors short circuits: he himself produces the cereals that will feed the pigs, guaranteed without antiobiotics. With the help of a start-up, he also installed a heat pump that recovers that produced by the animals to heat the buildings. As for sanitary products, it offers the services of an advisor for minimal and optimized use of treatments. Consequently, he only uses a quarter of the doses recommended by the health authorities. "It is true that thirty or even fifty years ago, we may not have been working with the right methods, recognizes the Breton breeder. But today, the techniques have radically changed. When I show my exploitation, people always come out of it subjugated. What is unfair is that we are judged without knowing all the progress that has been made in the environmental field. "

The height of paradox. More than eight in ten French people say they have a good or a very good opinion of farmers, according to an Odoxa-Dentsu Consulting survey for Franceinfo and Le Figaro carried out in February 2019.

Agribashing, a "fantasized" feeling?

For Eddy Fougier, political scientist and consultant, it is not the farmers who are questioned but "the conventional mode of agricultural production and its different characteristics", he wrote in a report produced for the FNSEA, the majority agricultural union , in September 2018. Or: "The use of phytosanitary products and biotechnologies, intensive livestock farming, large farms, export-oriented agriculture, etc."

Others go further. According to François Veillerette, director of the association Générations futures, "agribashing does not exist". This feeling "fantasized" is the result of an "outrageous" campaign orchestrated by the FNSEA whose "goal is not only to overturn some binding reforms, but also to restrict the freedom of expression of people or organizations criticizing the current agricultural system, "explains the environmental activist.

Agribashing is a fable, invented by those who want to prevent agriculture from evolving towards a sustainable model and https://t.co/BTUWc79gLS is distressing that the government falls into this rude trap.https: // t. co / JUmQA7utQ4 via @Reporterre

Everyone will judge. Agribashing or not, the loneliness of the farmers, the difficult living conditions, added to the recurring financial difficulties pose an implacable observation: according to figures from the Mutualité sociale agricole, in 2019, more than two farmers committed suicide every day in France.

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