The CAP after Brexit & 2020: a French view
French government report warns of problems for European agriculture after Brexit, while outlining priorities for CAP. […]
French government report warns of problems for European agriculture after Brexit, while outlining priorities for CAP. […]
A team of researchers in France have shown that is it possible to reduce pesticide use on most French arable farms without impacting on either yield or profitability. […]
The aim of the 4pour1000 initiative (4per1000 in English) is to increase carbon in the soil by 0.04%. This could help halt the annual increase in Co2 in the atmosphere. The initiative is seeking expert comments on biological soil indicators by 15th March. Mario Cattizone has more […]
Agriculture is everybody’s business. The way land is used and distributed is key to improving the quality of local food production, not to mention ecological forms of farming and livelier rural areas. […]
Pesticide victims Laurent Guillou and Stéphane Rouxel have won their cases against former employer Nutréa-Triskalia. The former employees at the Plouisy site of the giant Breton agricultural cooperative Triskalia suffered acute exposures to pesticides in 2009 and 2010. They suffer from hypersensitivity to everyday household chemicals (MCS), a condition that has also been recorded among Gulf war veterans. The decision by the Tribunal des Affaires de Sécurité Sociale (TASS) at Saint Brieuc to award damages to pesticide victims is the first of its kind to recognise MCS in the French justice system. After years of legal battles, their accusations that the massive use of pesticides in food production is an environmental and health scandal are being vindicated. Read: Pesticides – Did Co-op’s Practices Lead to Cancers? MCS is a debilitating condition: in the soundtrack of a campaign video [Paroles-de-Plouisy], Rouxel recounts that in his case it can be triggered by something as trivial as encountering people wearing perfume or after shave. The effects can come hours or days later and include severe headaches as well […]
A father and son team allege shoddy pesticide disposal practices from the past are implicated in their respective cancers. In an English language exclusive, Peter Crosskey has the story. […]
A fascinating power play is emerging in France around pesticides. Some noteworthy and challenging pesticide reduction policies policies, such as Ecophyto 2, have emerged. Meanwhile, major politicians are clashing and occasionally out flanking each other. Peter Crosskey unpacks the story for us, in an exclusive article. […]
The organic dairy sector in France has significant differences – but also some commonalities – with the conventional dairy sector. Rising consumer demand, producer organisations, and regional feed crop supply are among the differences – as is the decoupling of organic and conventional prices. […]
Errors of a previous administration, a billion euro dispute between France and the Commission, even bigger borrowing on the international markets, late payments to farmers – its a financial cap-tastrophe in France. Peter Crosskey untangles the mess. […]
Our most environmentally valuable farmland is condemned to a slow death by a combination of EU bureaucracy and national decisions. CAP’s so called greening ties up farmers in bureaucracy, uses valuable public money and still fails to protect nature or the incomes of farmers in marginalised areas adequately. There are however solutions. […]
Here we feature a pair of extracts from the publication Conversion to agroecology: France’s hopes for environmental salvation by ARC2020’s Peter Crosskey. It opens with the political move to introducing an agroecology law, and ends with criticism of the weakness of this move from the 15,000 member Confédération Paysanne. […]
Conversion to agroecology: France’s hopes for environmental salvation is a new 28 page ARC2020 document on efforts in France to move farming from pesticides to agroecological methods. […]
Aurélie Trouvé of ATTAC France released a book last year called Le Business Est Dans Le Pré (Business Is In The Meadow, subtitled How Agribusiness Is Drifting Into Crisis). ARC2020’s Peter Crosskey tells us about it. […]
IATP’s Ben Lilliston at #COP21 in Paris, examines France’s soil plans, and how agroecological or otherwise they are. […]
Like its failed predecessor, Ecophyto 2018, Ecophyto 2 aims to halve pesticide use in France during the coming decade. How will it fare? Peter Crosskey explores. […]
Agricultural and Rural Convention