December 11, 2023. Emmanuel Macron is in Toulouse. Damien Garrigues, arborist in Montauban and president of the Departmental Federation of Farmers’ Unions (FDSEA) of Tarn-et-Garonne, is invited with his deputy to a meeting with the President of the Republic on the peasant crisis. Barely arriving in the Pink City, the farmer learns that the meeting will finally take place with an advisor from the Elysée. At the prefecture, new surprise: no president, nor collaborator. Farmers are invited to discuss with advisors speaking… from Paris, by video. “An hour and a half drive, as if we had no video in Montauban,” says Damien Garrigues indignantly. The two men left the meeting in the middle, under the frightened eyes of state agents. Disgusted by the “contempt”, the “disconnection from the capital” and determined to put an end to these “meetings in the prefecture which lead to nothing”, says Damien Garrigues today.
Nearly two months later, the anger of the agricultural world has not subsided. Even the announcements from Gabriel Attal, present on Friday January 26 on a cattle farm in Haute-Garonne, are struggling to calm people’s minds. “Measurements,” says Hervé Lapie, cereal grower and secretary general of the National Federation of Farmers’ Unions (FNSEA). The Prime Minister had listed “ten immediate simplification measures” intended to calm the anger of the agricultural world. Among them, among others, the “end of the upward trajectory” of the tax on non-road diesel (GNR), an emblematic demand of the sector. It was not enough. “We were waiting for real announcements,” continues the trade unionist. “There were none.” After the speech, the union office as well as that of Young Farmers (JA) brought together their approximately 200 representatives in the region by videoconference. “There was no procrastination. Everyone said ‘let’s continue'”, says Franck Sander, farmer in Bas-Rhin and vice-president of the FNSEA. The Young Farmers declared on Saturday January 27 that they were considering blocking Paris and the inner suburbs from Monday January 29. “Everything is too vague, explains Franck Sander. Now, the balance of power will get worse.”
The lifting of the Carbonne dam (Haute-Garonne) announced on Friday January 26 by its local leader, Jérôme Bayle, cantonal delegate of the FDSEA, was only a sham. It all started from there, from this Occitania scarred by the accumulation of ever more restrictive standards, by climate crises, and by inflation too. Tuesday January 16, several hundred farmers gathered on the Place du Capitole, in Toulouse. “Our representatives had to see the prefect to respond to the anger,” says Guillaume Bénazet, breeder. The complaints are as numerous as they are heterogeneous. Purchasing power, grumbling against tax increases, questions about support linked to the drought which is hitting the region… At the end, the disappointment is as expected. Philippe Jougla, president of the regional section of the FNSEA, finishes his report under the whistles.
“There’s nothing to be surprised about”
A man, Jérôme Bayle, asks for the microphone. He proposes blocking a highway point on Thursday. In one speech, he becomes one of the figures of the protest. The era produces its headliners at the speed of a Wi-Fi connection. “He told us: ‘Let those who have a pair of big balls like me follow me.’ We did it,” says Valentin Lassalle-Carrère, treasurer of the Young Farmers of Hautes-Pyrénées. The movement of anger in the agricultural world, which has been brewing for months, is exploding into broad daylight. One month from the Agricultural Show and a few months from the European elections.
In a few days, the blaze extended well beyond the South-West. Tax on GNR, compensation for natural disasters, prices of mass distribution… “There is no reason to be surprised, neither by the demands, nor by the anger, believes today Patrick Bénézit, vice-president of the FNSEA. We just didn’t know when it would happen.”
The panels returned
The warning signs were there from the start of the school year in September. “We suffered a scissor effect,” explains Franck Sander. “Our production costs skyrocketed in 2022, while prices remained the same or fell the following year.” Added to the financial difficulties are the problems of each territory. Occitania, where agricultural income is the lowest in the country, hit by drought and epizootic hemorrhagic disease in cattle, is suffering from bad luck.
To resolve their difficulties, farmers tried to raise the alarm. The last week of October, motivated by the schoolboy initiative of young revelers who, the previous month, had reversed the signs of municipalities of the department, the Young Farmers of Tarn decide to return them. “We waited for people to question before explaining our gesture”, says Christophe Rieunau, general secretary of the JA du Tarn. The stunt works, and the “overturned panels” are reproduced throughout France. The slogan “We walk on our heads”, symbol of demands, is spreading. At the same time, meetings are multiplying to deal with difficulties, without leading to great satisfaction.
More “muscular” actions
Inspired by the spectacular actions of German farmers converging by tractor towards Berlin, their French counterparts decided at the start of the year to move on to more “muscular” actions: the Carbonne dam (Haute-Garonne), in this case. The “without label” event was organized in less than forty-eight hours, using a WhatsApp loop called “We block Carbonne”. It had 30 people when it was created, and now more than 500. In other departments, the unions are trying to regain control of the movement. “The terrain commands,” concedes Jérémie De Ré, vice-president of the Young Farmers of Gers. “When the time is right, you have to support it. We met by cantons, then by departments to raise demands and organize the blocking points.”
Unions seen as “too soft”
Unionists make calls, create loops, send emails. They are also the privileged interlocutors of territorial intelligence agents, with whom many of them have established “relationships of trust”. “They drink coffee with us on the blockades,” says Valentin Lassalle-Carrère. “Some even brought us pastries.” “Gift-and-take” exchanges, say the farmers. “We give them some information and we try to obtain as much as possible,” explains Jérémie De Ré. The police warn them if a minister has to go to the scene of a blockage, if announcements have to be made soon. “They also give us some indications on our demands: on what types of points do they see the most feverish politicians? Where can we support more?” continues the farmer from Gers.
Buoyed by the goodwill of Beauvau – Gérald Darmanin had soothing words on TF1’s 20 Hours -, the farmers are pushing their advantage. Even if it means, sometimes, giving free rein to excesses. Tuesday January 23, in Lot-et-Garonne, in Agen, agricultural waste was dumped in front of the prefecture. In Hérault, a supermarket parking lot was plowed on January 25, the bitumen was turned over with excavators. The previous week, an explosion targeted a public building in Carcassonne, in Aude. “Some farmers find the unions too soft,” recognizes Damien Garrigues. Organizations that intend to demonstrate their ability to manage anger recognize that they have difficulty channeling it. Not without also playing on it: brandishing the threat of uncontrollable anger is also a way of pushing the government into negotiation. “We are not calling for public property to be degraded, obviously. But today, many have nothing to lose,” said Rémi Dumas, wine grower in Hérault and vice-president of Young Farmers.
The accident which caused the death of a farmer and her daughter on a dam in Pamiers, in Ariège, on January 23, has barely dampened their determination. “The people of Ariège told us, ‘It’s too hard, we’ll stop.’ For two or three hours, we asked ourselves the question of stopping the movement,” says Hervé Lapie. But the will of the “field” is the opposite. In Bas-Rhin, where the first blockades were launched on Monday January 22, 700 tractors paraded through the streets of Strasbourg four days later. “An unprecedented mobilization,” enthuses Franck Sander. The demonstration was lifted by a majority of raised hands, with the promise to return the following Tuesday. The declaration of demonstration was filed even before Gabriel Attal’s announcements, “just in case”, the trade unionist told us. Farmers know that timing is the secret to a good harvest.