Yohan Grelet is a market gardener near Clermont Ferrand. Under these greenhouses, he grows lettuces, carrots and tomatoes… His 80 hectares of agricultural land hold the High Environmental Value label, like nearly 30,000 farms in France.
To justify his HVE label, Yohan Grelet must implement certain practices, listed in specifications drawn up by the Ministry of Agriculture. Gestures for biodiversity noted in points. It takes 40 to get the label.
Irrigate your plot with a drip system, for example, gives up to six points. Using less phytosanitary products, pesticides for example, gives you 0 to five points. An incentive but not binding scale.
High Environmental Value does not mean 0 treatment. We have to keep a little leeway
Yohan Grelet, HVE farmerat the eye of 8 p.m.
“If we have an attack of aphids or lettuce disease, we have to intervene because in fact we are not going to watch our lettuce die.” Explains Yohan Grelet.
Promoting more sustainable agriculture, halfway between organic and conventional, was the objective of the Ministry of Agriculture when it created this label in 2012. But ten years later, has the objective been achieved? A report by the French Biodiversity Office from October 2022 writes:
All of the analyzes show that the effect of HVE certification is limited overall. (…) The majority of farms can easily access HVE certification, so the extent of the changes to be made to be certified is very low.
A less restrictive label than that of organic farming. Which has enabled the number of certified farms to be multiplied by 30 over the past four years. And in some supermarkets, these HVE-labeled fruits and vegetables sometimes replace organic products, which are more expensive and whose sales fall with inflation. As this seller, filmed with a hidden camera, admits:
“The brand has chosen to take this rather than organic, it must already be cheaper, after that there are still treatments, but much lighter, much less harmful for the person, it’s semi-organic in fact.”
Commercial strategy
So do some brands have an interest in betting on these HVE products? Contacted, an intermediary of the large distribution recognizes that pressure would be exerted on certain farmers for commercial reasons he says.
“We had to quickly respond to something that looked like organic. All of that served them to supply the shelves. And the average consumer will say to himself that it’s not organic, but I’ll do a good deed by buying HVE, but it there is still a deception on the goods.”
The market gardeners were either referenced because they were HVE, or they were dereferenced because they did not take the label
A retail consultantat the eye of 8 p.m.
According to some organic producers, this label would maintain confusion. Last January, the Federation of Organic Farmers filed a lawsuit against the HVE label, for misleading the consumer. A fight supported by Jean-Marie Roy, organic farmer in Vendée. He believes that the HVE label would be an unfair competitor:
“When we are on criteria like these, I say to myself, it pulls agriculture down. We plant three trees and two hedges and we get a good mark, but in the end we haven’t solved the problem. problem of agriculture that uses pesticides and chemicals.”
Contacted, the Ministry of Agriculture denies its accusations. He explains that the farms are checked every 18 months and that the HVE label is not a competing label but complementary to organic farming.