The protests sweeping France have once again highlighted the plight of farmers, a shrinking and aging group at the mercy of volatile prices and grappling with a bleak economic outlook. FRANCE 24 speaks with an economist and trade union expert about the main figures behind the agricultural crisis in France.
French farmers expanded their roadblocks on Wednesday to protest low food prices, rising costs and regulations that they say are eliminating their livelihoods.
The protests, part of a growing wave of anger among agricultural producers across the European Union, pose a major challenge to President Emmanuel Macron’s government, and come just months before European elections.
These unrest have reopened sensitive debate in France, the largest agricultural producer in the European Union, which has seen the number of farmers shrink from 2.5 million farmers in the 1950s to less than half a million today.
Not only did the agricultural population of France shrink dramatically; It’s also older than ever. According to the latest available CensusThe average age of farmers was 51.4 years in 2020, up from 50.2 years in 2010.
Of the 496,000 farmers counted in 2020, nearly 200,000 – two-fifths of the total – will be eligible for retirement by 2026. At the same time, ambitious young farmers are being shut out of the industry, unable to invest in land and property.
“Young people who want to work in agriculture must invest hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of euros in a notoriously difficult profession, with long working hours, on-call duties, few holidays, and a fluctuating income.” says economist Alessandra Kirsch, head of studies at the French research center “Agricultural Strategies.”
“The loan payments they have to make in the first few years are very high compared to the small profits the farms make,” she explains.
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Improving the attractiveness of the sector is crucial to its survival, adds Johann Barbey, a cattle farmer from eastern France who sits on the board of FNSEA, France’s main agricultural federation.
“We need to offer people the opportunity to have better working conditions,” he says. “We are lucky enough to work in contact with nature, but we have to be able to make ends meet as well.”
100,000 fewer farms in one decade
The natural result of the shrinking workforce is an almost identical decline in the total number of farms, falling by about 21% between 2010 and 2020 – meaning the loss of about 100,000 businesses within a decade.
Kirsch points to major obstacles to handing farms over from one generation to another, due to real estate costs and a lack of candidates.
“Not to mention the fact that the value of agricultural production declines over time: to produce the same wealth, you need more capital and more labor,” she adds. “That’s why you end up with bigger farms that employ more people, but don’t earn more.”
The recent trend explains why actual agricultural area remained largely stable between 2010 and 2020, shrinking by only 1% nationwide.
The difficulties experienced by farmers have been blamed for a significantly higher suicide rate than in the wider population.
In 2020, the suicide rate among farmers aged 15 to 64 was 43.2% higher than the national average, according to figures compiled by the World Health Organization. Mutuelle Sociale Agricole (MSA), the main provider of health insurance in the agricultural sector.
“It is a profession that requires a lot of work and knowledge in many fields (commerce, management, agronomy), and it is constantly under fire,” says Kirsch. “Basically reconciling professional and social life is not easy in such circumstances, and it is easy to lose one’s status.”
For Barb, the rancher, agricultural workers have been left behind while the rest of the professional world adapts to changing times.
“Nowadays, when we sit down for our evening meal on Sundays, I’m the only one who wakes up to go tend to the cows,” he says.
Poorer and more vulnerable
Struggling to cover costs and bills, while worrying about uncertain profits, is an all-too-familiar experience for most farmers.
The proportion of farm households living below the poverty line is 17.4%, which is higher than the proportion of blue-collar workers (13.9%) and clerical workers (12.1%), and is almost double the national average (9.2%), according to 17.4%. to Forget itNational Institute of Statistics.
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Kirsch says farmers’ greatest vulnerability is the result of extreme fluctuations in their income.
“Market prices can change in a matter of weeks, and a weather threat can wipe out a harvest in a matter of hours. In other professions, you negotiate your salary, set a selling price, and set expectations. In agriculture, you don’t know what your income will be until you harvest and sell—and you don’t You are the one who sets the price.
The extreme fluctuations in grain prices indicate the challenges facing farmers.
The price of wheat fell to 214 euros per tonne in December, its lowest level in more than two years and less than half its value in May 2022, according to Euronext.
Kirsch points to several factors behind this sharp decline, starting with abundant Russian stocks that allow Moscow to sell its wheat at very competitive prices, making it able to compete with the French.
Bad weather conditions have exacerbated the deprivation faced by French farmers.
“It was difficult to get the tractors into the flooded fields to prepare the soil and plant in a timely manner,” Kirsch explains. “So we expect a bad harvest, along with prices below production costs.”
This article is a translation of the original text in French.