A-Infos (en) France, UCL AL #347 - Politics, Peasant Confederation: "The government's announcements are a regression" (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

After the large movement in the agricultural community at the end of 
January, the government made a slew of announcements at the beginning of 
February, which seemed to satisfy the FNSEA. We were able to ask a few 
questions to Vincent, a goat breeder in the Var and member of the 
Confédération Paysanne, to take stock of the situation and the 
continuation of these mobilizations. ---- Can you summarize the 
government's announcements and their effects? Why does the FNSEA welcome 
this?
The second series of announcements from Gabriel Attal are in fact things 
that were already in negotiation with the FNSEA and the JA[1]. These are 
measures that only satisfy big farmers, or in fact only some of the big 
ones. The decline on the Ecophyto plan is a bit of a smokescreen to 
please the FNSEA. The other measures are fiscal and only serve a portion 
of the farmers it represents.

It is mainly cereal and olive growers who run the FNSEA, like its 
president Arnaud Rousseau who is president of the Avril group[2]: they 
are happy. For the other members it is more complicated: cattle breeders 
for example are in the process of organizing a resumption of the movement.

Locally we see that the FNSEA and the JA will relaunch actions because 
the base is unhappy with the announcements. For us at the Confédération 
paysanne, these announcements are more of a regression than a step 
forward. We want to continue the movement on our own demands, as we have 
been doing from the start.

What are your demands at the Conf?

Right now they focus on two main points. First, income: demanding floor 
prices for foodstuffs equivalent to our cost prices, that is to say our 
production costs, our remuneration and our social security 
contributions. Laws on the subject have been passed in Spain and 
Belgium, for example, to ensure fairer prices and prohibit selling at a 
loss.

Secondly, we are calling for the cancellation of free trade agreements: 
an end to discussions on Mercosur[3]for example. Also, during the 
movement, they dared to sign an agreement between Chile and the European 
Union. In these agreements, agricultural materials serve as currency: in 
the latter case, Chile mainly wants to export rare earths, and Europe 
industrial goods. We are demanding an end to these agreements, which are 
harmful for European farmers, but also for agriculture in the countries 
of the South.

We see that the movement is international, with demonstrations in many 
European countries. Are there any prospects for international coordination?

At the Conf' level, we are members of Via Campesina, a grouping of 
farmers' unions on a global scale, and of ECVC, its European 
counterpart. At the European level we have real discussions, 
particularly on the response to the far right, on this subject we have 
been quite inspired by the Germans from AbL[4]in recent months. There 
was also a big Via Campesina rally in Brussels a few weeks ago during 
the last European Commission.

Can you expand on the subject of the extreme right in the agricultural 
world?

At the Conf we realize that like everywhere, the far right is 
progressing. Over the past twenty years, this has notably involved the 
growth of the Rural Coordination (CR), a far-right agricultural union 
with truly reactionary and conservative ideas, with slogans bordering on 
Pétainism, which has made significant progress in professional 
elections. . Even if France only has 400,000 farmers left, we are one of 
the most unionized professions so these developments are quickly seen. 
Like everywhere, this rise is linked to impoverishment, the collapse of 
public services... There are fewer and fewer people available to help us 
at the MSA[5], at the agricultural services of the DDT[6]... There is a 
real feeling of abandonment among the farmers.

Coming back to the January/February mobilizations, can you tell us how 
they started?

At the very beginning, the movement started very spontaneously in the 
southwest, mainly on the question of health and administrative 
standards. The FNSEA and the JA caught up with the movement afterwards.

It started from the union bases, or even from non-unionized people. This 
first time was an opportunity to get in touch with these people. Once 
the FNSEA and the JA took over the movement, it was much more 
complicated to go to their gatherings: we were no longer welcome. Since 
the mobilizations against mega-basins, it has been complicated to come 
to an FNSEA gathering with a Conf' flag.

On the side of the Confederation, we also hung up the movement after 
this spontaneous departure, but we do not have at all the same demands 
as the FNSEA. We are demanding the installation of a million farmers, 
smaller farms, fewer pesticides, an end to glyphosate and 
neonicotinoids... Quite quickly there was no longer any dialogue possible.

Do you think the mobilizations could resume?

We at the Conf' never "stopped"! Over the last two weeks we have focused 
a lot of the fight on large supermarkets and their logistics platforms, 
either by blocking the platforms, or by holding farmers' markets in 
front of supermarkets, and awareness-raising actions among customers to 
show them that our products are often cheaper and of better quality for 
direct sale. We are trying to point out that the current system 
penalizes everyone: underpaid farmers and consumers who pay prices 
inflated by the margins of mass distribution. Now we are trying to 
prepare international actions against large grain or dairy groups. We 
also want to put pressure on before the agricultural show.

It is important to understand the context: the next professional 
agricultural elections will be in January 2025, so in addition to the 
real difficulties, there is also a desire on the part of unions to 
occupy the field in preparation for the elections. The subject will 
remain on the 2024 agenda for the months to come.

What is your assessment of the movement so far?

Even if for us, we consider that we are currently in defeat, we can 
still see that these mobilizations have been able to give visibility to 
our struggles and our demands to the general public. The collective work 
"Taking back the land from the machines" clearly develops the idea that 
the changes necessary for a transformation towards peasant agriculture 
can only be made if farmers have the support of the rest of society. We 
were able to see moments of rapprochement with the population during the 
movement, and that is great progress.

Comments collected by N. Bartosek

To validate

[1]The Young Farmers, an agricultural union very close to the FNSEA

[2]Agro-industrial group specializing in oils, having achieved 9 billion 
euros in turnover in 2022

[3]Southern Common Market, free trade zone bringing together Argentina, 
Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Bolivia

[4]Arbeitsgemeinschaft bäuerliche Landwirtschafttra, German equivalent 
of the Peasant Confederation

[5]Agricultural social mutuality, compulsory social protection scheme 
for agricultural professions

[6]Departmental Directorate of Territories

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Confederation-paysanne-Les-annonces-du-gouvernement-sont-une-regression
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