Speeches encouraging people to equip themselves with more efficient irrigation systems or to favor less water-intensive crops are multiplying. But in the fields, for financial reasons, people hesitate to take the risk of such strategic choices.
Faced with global warming and its consequences, Emmanuel Macron intends “Supporting the transformations of our agricultural model” and even the “reinvent”. In his speech on the government’s water plan at the end of March, the President of the Republic did not minimize the challenge facing agriculture. As summer approaches, the prospect of another drought has turned the spotlight on irrigating farmers, accused of maintaining a model incompatible with a world at +2°C. Replace the most water-intensive crops, plant trees or hedges, diversify farms… The solutions, on paper, are common sense. But in the field, farmers who adapt somehow to these new conditions, point to the limits of their action in the face of the inertia of a system that is beyond them.
“Farmers have always adapted to the conditions, it’s part of the job”, assures Rodolphe Couturier, cereal farmer in Beauce. In 2018, he tried his hand at the vine, first on one hectare, on the sidelines of his arable farming activity. Unheard of in the region. In June of this year, he planted a total of 2.5 hectares. By diversifying and trading in the finished product, “the goal was to bring economic resilience to the operation”, he continues. And even if France’s granary will not become its cellar tomorrow, the cereal grower-wine grower observes “a majority” of its neighbors a desire to open up to other cultures. A few kilometers away, a farmer has taken up lavender. Another grows flax. Less water-intensive, these plots are insurance in case of bad years.
Change yes, but at what cost?
Since the grain grower is also a winegrower, he is delighted to have “the opportunity to make the profession of farmer known and to explain the inconsistencies between what we are asked and what we can do”. Like many of his colleagues, Rodolphe Couturier points “a discrepancy between words and deeds. I want to change, I do. But I’m not going to run into the wall, because we are being asked to do otherwise and ultimately the consumer does not pay the price that goes with it.” Diversifying away from irrigation and restoring biodiversity has many benefits, but also costs.
Much further south, in the Gers, Philippe Mrozinski cannot imagine abandoning his plots of corn. “Diversification becomes complicated when you buy a tonne of corn twice the price of a tonne of sunflower”notes the cereal farmer. To the uninitiated, he explains: “Imagine that a jeweler decides to replace gold with tinplate in his shop. Will he be able to sell his jewelry at the same price as before? Of course not.”
“Charge farmers to make this transition to ecological agriculture, vsis like asking a Renault technician to solve the transport problem”sums up Sylvain Doublet, agricultural engineer and adviser for the Solagro association. “He may be able to tell you how to do it, but it’s not at his level that these decisions are made.” According to him, this absurd request reflects ignorance of a complex system, where agricultural cooperatives, commodity markets, agribusiness, mass distribution and ultimately, the consumer, lead the dance.
“The question is: are today’s sectors still adapted to tomorrow’s climate? No!”
Sylvain Doublet, agricultural engineerat franceinfo
In the fields too, time is money
In the face of drought, but also in the face of violent rains, which are also more and more frequent due to climate change, the soil proves to be an indispensable ally. A “sponge”, sums up Florent Estebenet, another cereal farmer in the department. Problem: This solution is slow. Very slow : “Several years to have a sufficient level of organic matter in the soil to increase its water retention capacity and especially its restitution during the summer period”believes the operator.
However, in the fields too, time is money. “The first years, the ground is not ready, the farmer gropes”describes agroclimatologist Serge Zaka. “There is a loss of performance. Even if it lasts 3 to 5 years, and it bears fruit later, imagine that you are deducted 40% of your salary by saying to you: ‘It’s good, we will pay it to you in 5 years!'” Faced with these constraints, many hope that the good years will cushion the shock of the bad ones, rather than risk reducing volumes.
What about agroforestry, praised by the ministry to the chambers of agriculture for its ability to restore the soil, protect it against climatic hazards and restore biodiversity? In 2021, the France 2030 plan devoted 50 million euros to encourage the planting of hedgerows and rows of trees between plots. The initiative has been a great success everywhere in France, here in Normandy, there in the Vosges. By storing carbon, hedges, trees and plant cover initiate a virtuous circle. The farmer can even profit from it, through the resale of carbon credits, for example.
Except that… “Planting trees and hedges takes up space, it creates shade, it puts vegetation in competition for water and requires a new technique”explains Serge Zaka.
“On paper, the general public thinks: ‘It’s great, we have the solution’. But on the ground, it’s more complicated than that.”
Serge Zaka, agroclimatologistat franceinfo
The sole logic of yield is no longer appropriate, adds Sylvain Doublet. Freed from the goal of overproducing, “a new agricultural model must also remunerate the farmer according to the ecosystem services provided by his farm”. That is to say, to financially reward actions that are beneficial to the environment.
A policy to heal climate pay
“Because it rained too much, 2016 was a terrible year for French wheat. In 2021, it fell victim to late frosts. In 2022, it was fine, but for corn, it was a disaster”, list Sylvain Doublet. These unpredictable conditions call for “the agricultural system to regain some flexibility and resilience, with sectors that deploy strategies that take into account global warming in decisions. Strategies that assume that there is no water” , hammers the agronomist. “Massification of irrigation will not happen.”
For a long time, France believed that its water resources were almost inexhaustible. As of January 1, the State has undertaken to release 600 million euros per year, to help farmers cope with the effects of global warming. After the drought of 2022, the Ministry of Agriculture even deployed 30 million euros to help farmers equip themselves with less expensive systems. Alas, in the Gers, Philippe Mrozinski notes above all that prices are exploding at the rate of these subsidies.
“We are talking about indemnities and millions of euros, but the sector needs several billions if it wants to succeed in these transitions to other crops, species, varieties, practices…”
Serge Zaka, agroclimatologistat franceinfo
And regret the “band-aid policy” establishment. “At the time of the green revolution, in the 1960s, farmers answered the call of politicians”, he continues. Pigs and chickens here, cereals and cattle there… The face of the “France farm” is the result of this planning. Sixty years later, climate change is already transforming these landscapes. To accompany this injunction to “doing otherwise”, an Agricultural Orientation and Future Pact and Law (PLOAA) must, by the summer, “setting a course for French agriculture by 2040”. A transition or a revolution?