Behind winegrowers in crisis, overwhelming cooperatives

For three months, Fanny [*]a winegrower in Gard, no longer receives the monthly installments owed to her by her cooperative cellar for her 2023 harvest. « Concretely, I no longer have the cash to purchase fertilizers and essential products for the next harvest. I'm wondering if I continue or not… »

Obviously, the farmer asks questions about the management of her cellar: how was the wine produced from her vines sold, in bulk or in bottle? ? And at what price ? « Why is my organic grape production paid at the conventional price? ? I wrote to the management several times for information, but I never heard back. »

In the processions of tractors blocking the roads in recent months, many wine growers warned of their declining income. « With more grapes brought to the cellar, my deposits have been decreasing for two years »testifies Bernard [*]well into his fifties, winegrower in Aude. He is a member of the Vendéole cellar, the largest in Languedoc-Roussillon with 340,000 hectoliters of wine produced each year.

« It's been two months since I got paid »deplores Julien in turn [*]member of the Celliers du Soleil winery in Cuxac-d'Aude, near Narbonne. All three requested anonymity for fear of retaliation if they openly criticize the structure they are with financially « bound hands and feet ».

The “ second village church »

Cooperative cellars were created more than a century ago as a tool for pooling means of production. In France, 570 cooperative cellars produce 60 % of grapes intended for wine production and vinify 37 % (excluding Cognac). In Occitanie, the leading national vineyard in terms of agricultural area, there are 230. They are managed by a board of directors elected by the members. « When everything is going well, it's the best tool in the worldadmits Anaïs Amalric, winegrower for three generations and treasurer of the Moussac cellar, in Gard. And when there are crises, everyone questions their structure. »

The winegrower undertakes to deliver all or part of his harvest. « Typically, wineries operate under five-year contracts. If you leave before, you pay compensation which can correspond to tens of thousands of euros »explains Fanny. In exchange, the winery takes care of the vinification, storage and marketing of the wine. The cooperator receives a monthly deposit calculated based on sales.

« This system made it possible to invest in equipment and to produce stakes that everyone produced in their corner »continues Anaïs Amalric. In Languedoc-Roussillon at the beginning of the XX^e century, the cooperative cellar became the « second village church ».

According to the Vignerons Coopérateurs, there are around a hundred cellars in serious financial difficulty due to an overproduction crisis affecting in particular the production of cheap red wine intended for mass distribution and export. In supermarkets alone, sales of red wine decreased, from 5.1 million to 3.5 million hectoliters between 2017 and 2023 [1].

The control of trade

Consequence of the sluggish market: the traders, intermediaries who buy and resell the wines, often after having transformed them or packaged them in bottles, do not come to collect the production as they had promised to do. Leading to financial problems, explains Anaïs Amalric: « Cellars are only paid once the wine is removed. You can have all your wine reserved and not have pocketed a cent. Some cellars therefore find themselves without cash flow and can no longer pay their members' deposits. »

Winegrowers are entangled in a contradictory model. On the one hand, the vats are full and the wine cannot find buyers. On the other hand, they must strive to maintain high yields despite climate change which is affecting harvests. « Without making volumes, you can't liveexplains Christophe Rouvin, winegrower in Gard, member of the Gallician cellar. You are paid per hectolitre, from which you must deduct cellar costs. At the time, I was paid 130 euros per hectoliter. In 2022, more than 110 euros. If prices fall on the markets, your only room for maneuver is volume. »

Today, generating volume is no longer enough to be sure of selling your wine. If wine growers want to break even, they must increase « in quality » to respect the specifications of their appellations. « Traders ask [le label] High environmental value, or henceforth Terra Vitis. Before, this allowed you to earn more. Now, it's the union minimum if you don't want to sell at a loss »explains Bernard.

In the cellars, the multiplication of quality labels has made it necessary to increase the number of vats so as not to mix the labeled grapes (organic label, IGP, AOC) with others and guarantee product traceability. In fact increasing the duration of the harvest.

« In my time, in three weeks, the harvest was donesays Alain Boyer, 76 years old, president of the Gard cellar of Gallician for twenty years. With the congestion in the cellars, we are obliged to spread out the reception of the grapes over time. ; the grapes are therefore not always harvested at the best time in terms of maturity. Also leading to losses for the producer. »

« They distribute the crumbs to farmers »

The smallest cellars which were unable to invest in these new standards were absorbed by their neighbors. In recent years, mergers have accelerated, particularly for wineries specializing in export. In 2022, in the former Languedoc-Roussillon, 165 cellars produced as much (8.6 million hectoliters) as the 212 structures that still existed in 2010 (8.5 million hectoliters).

This is the case of the Vendéole cellar, in Aude, resulting from the merger in 2021 of the Malepère cellar, in Arzens, and the Razès cellar, in Routier. Bernard, for fear that the tool would escape the control of winegrowers, was opposed to this merger. « The sector takes the model of dairy and cereal cooperatives. The cooperative cellars are getting bigger and bigger, supposedly to sell the wine, but in the end, it becomes industrial, they make money and distribute the crumbs to the farmers. »

« The feeling of being in a multinational »

Same story with the Celliers du Soleil cellar, bringing together 600 members and 2,500 hectares of vines, resulting from the merger of four cooperative cellars from Aude and the eastern Pyrenees. « When I went to the general assembly, I had the impression of being in a multinationaltestifies Julien. We have shares in trading and holding companies, but in the end, where does the money go? ? It's occult. And you no longer have the accounts automatically at the general meeting, it's only if you ask for them. »

The Celliers du Soleil cellar owns shares in the Vinadeis group which brings together 32 estates and châteaux, and 10 cooperative cellars. Recently, the group merged with Cordier by InVivo, a subsidiary of the InVivo group, which owns the Gamm Vert and Jardiland franchises and which achieved a turnover of 12.4 billion euros in 2023.

A model to reinvent

In Gard, the number of cooperatives has increased from 70 to 58 in ten years. But some voices are raised against the advent of these large structures: « I want to stay in a cellar on a human scale where when we redo a label, we can ask the cooperators for their opinion »argues Anaïs Amalric, also president of the Mutualité sociale agricole du Gard. But it also invites cooperators to pay more attention to the functioning of their common tool. « As in the associative world in general, the structure always relies on a few volunteers. The others just bring their grapes »observe-t-elle.

« No one is vying to be president »confirms Alain Boyer. He describes the difficulties he had in the 1990s in diversifying the sources of income of his structure with 60 wine growers so as to no longer depend on trading alone. We first had to convince the cooperators to turn to quality and to do so, agree to reduce their output.

« A risky bet, but successful since the prices were more profitablehe says. It’s also because we have invested in sales. It took us twenty years to go from 10 % of direct marketing at 60 %. Our turnover increased from 5 to 10 million euros. »

« There are cellars that work well. They are those who know how to adapt to consumer demand. In Aude, many winegrowers want to irrigate the vines to produce more and continue with phyto [les produits phytosanitaires] : everything the consumer does not want. The profession also needs to question itself »pleads Bernard.

Instead, he suggested planting grape varieties adapted to climate change and organizing events in the vineyards. But he hit a wall in the profession. « Organic or climate change are still taboo in our union bodies, dominated by FNSEA. France is late… »

legend