how the Têt river, in the Pyrénées-Orientales, became the symbol of the battle for water

The Têt, the longest river in the Pyrénées-Orientales, irrigates the fertile Roussillon plain. Sometimes swollen by torrential rains, sometimes almost dry in summer. Water has always been diverted to irrigate crops, via canals that distribute water from the Têt over nearly 10,000 cultivated hectares.

Even if the drip has been installed, agriculture remains greedy and takes 280 million cubic meters from the river each year, the equivalent of 10,000 Olympic swimming pools, while drought sets in in France this winter.

The prefect appealed

“There must be an evolution of channel management”, defends Simon Popy, president of the association France Nature Environnement (FNE) who fears, in the long term, a disappearance of the Têt. The administrative court also ruled in favor of FNE last November. Farmers must now reduce their withdrawals from the river by a quarter.

A thousand peasants and local elected officials came to say no to these restrictions on January 28 in Perpignan (Pyrénées-Orientales) and asked for new water reservoirs. The administrative court considered that the urgency was there, but the joint union counter-attacks with a new study. The prefect has appealed the decision and farmers are hoping for derogations in the summer. The water war has begun.