Angry farmers: Macron “will request a new exemption on the issue of fallow land”, announces Attal

2024-01-27 04:33:04

Farmers will have to be patient for a few more days on the issue of fallow land. Gabriel Attal was to respond to their anger this Friday, after a meeting on a cattle farm in Haute-Garonne. If the Prime Minister did not announce anything concrete on this subject, he promised a response from Emmanuel Macron during the European Council. “The president will commit next week and request a new exemption on the issue of fallow land. I know it’s eagerly awaited,” he assured.

Via the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), it is the European Union which requires farmers to leave 4% of their land arable. Gabriel Attal explained that leaving Europe would mean sitting on 9 billion euros per year. He also indicated that simplifications would be welcome. “That the CAP must be simplified is obvious,” he said. Marc Fesneau, (the Minister of Agriculture) will continue to go to Brussels to ask for additional simplifications at European level. »

At the heart of the demands, the question of fallow land illustrates the debate on the regulations introduced by Brussels in favor of the ecological transition. But, “when we are told this year there will be 4% compulsory fallow, for us, it is not understandable in the context”, complained last Tuesday Arnaud Rousseau, president of the FNSEA.

The CAP in the sights of farmers

This measure appears in the CAP adopted in 2021 by the EU and applied since January 2023. The CAP conditions the payment of direct aid to farms on compliance with environmental standards. Farmers are therefore required to leave 4% of arable land fallow or in “agroecological infrastructure” (hedges, groves, ditches, ponds, etc.). This rate can nevertheless drop to 3% under certain conditions.

These “eco-schemes” offer additional bonuses to farmers participating in more demanding environmental programs. But many farmers are now complaining about late payments, because they are suspended from controls deemed to be finicky on the ground.

The Élysée seemed sensitive to farmers’ request to cancel the obligation to leave 4% of their cultivable areas idle. Claim supported by the consequences of the war in Ukraine – a major producer of cereals – which underline the fragility of food sovereignty. After the outbreak of the Russian offensive, farmers benefited from an exemption from this rule in order to be able to produce more to compensate for the disruptions in grain supplies from Ukraine and Russia. It expired at the end of 2023. Around ten countries, including France, had called for the continuation of at least a partial exemption. In vain.