Threats, insults, sabotage… foresters denounce repeated attacks

“We have workers who have been spat in the face.” Philippe Belchi is responsible for a territorial unit of the National Forestry Office (ONF), between Val-d’Oise and Yvelines. Recently, the Office carried out a survey with very telling results: in Île-de-France, nearly nine out of ten agents said they had already witnessed or been victims of an altercation in the performance of their duties. “These are tags in the forest: ‘ONF assassin, ONF thief’describes Philippe Belchi. There are a lot of derogatory and aggressive remarks about cuts. Afterwards, there are those who will break windscreen wipers, mirrors, windshields of our vehicles. It’s more than acts of incivility, it really is aggression.”

This is also the observation made by forestry cooperatives. One of them decided to react after a fire in the Morvan. On March 17, an arson attack destroyed a large forestry machine in the town of Brassy, ​​in Nièvre. This big heap of charred scrap metal hasn’t moved for two months. “This forestry machine is a carrier used to skid, to remove the wood from a cut of a plotobserves Xavier Finous, site manager for the Bourgogne Limousin Forestry Cooperative (CFBL). There is a real misunderstanding, a feeling of injustice. We dedicate our professional life to being a forester and it is a profession of passion. He is noble. To have to face this type of abuse is extremely poignant.”

Alongside Xavier, the boss of the cooperative explains that a few days before this fire, on another site, his workers discovered a hanging doll. Wherever its teams work – in Burgundy, Auvergne and Limousin – it regularly happens that they are the target of insults or, much more rarely, physical attacks. “We are really in a zone of lawlessness”says Lionel Say, CEO of the CFBL.

“Our foresters have the same feeling as fire trucks that get stoned when they go to the suburbs. Fire, attacks, threats are neither acceptable nor bearable.”

Lionel Say, general manager of the CFBL forestry cooperative

at franceinfo

“Between 2021 and 2022, four construction machines suffered irreparable damage: cut brake cables, exhaust pipes filled with earth, flooded engines”, says the NFB in a press release. Who blames the foresters? Regarding the arson in the Morvan, the track of environmental activists is far from being privileged according to information from franceinfo. On the other hand, what is certain is that these attacks took place in a context of strong opposition.

Faced with their many detractors, private cooperatives highlight the nature protection and birds. “The forester works with nature and makes sure to have a beautiful natureassures Lionel Say. And if I have a message to convey, it is this one.

But elected officials, scientists, associations criticize in particular the clear cuts, a practice which undermines biodiversity, with consequences already perceptible to the naked eye. “The Morvan was 60% to 70% hardwood, today it’s the opposite, softwoods cover the landscape and that’s not trivial”, says Sylvain Angerand. A forest engineer by training, he is the campaign coordinator for the association Canopée forêt vivant. “The clean cut is a bit like the surgeon who, as a last resort, must cut off the arm for gangrenehe continues. Clear cutting is the strongest destabilization of the forest stand and what is criticized for forestry cooperatives is that they use heavy artillery a little too often: clear cutting followed by planting. They then go and sell work; they are the ones who sell the plans, they are the ones who sell the wood. And so cooperatives have an economic interest in advising landowners to cut and replant with softwoods.”

For its part, the organization which brings together all the private cooperatives, the Union of French Forestry Cooperation (UCFF), denounces these remarks which are “the fruit of a lack of knowledge of French forest management and which furthermore encourages an unjustified hatred towards foresters.” Two visions of the forest clash and the one who will decide is the State. The associations are expecting a lot from the new government, for whom the climate “must be at the heart of all policies.”