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– Christiane Lambert is president, until the end of September, of the main farmers’ pressure group in the European Union.
An appointment in a tense context. Christiane Lamberta pig farmer and former head of the FNSEA, will take over the presidency of the lobby of charcuterie producing companies on Monday 1 July, announced this Friday 28 June this organisation which defends the interests of SMEs and heavyweights in the sector, such as Fleury Michon. Still president (until the end of September) of the main lobby group for farmers in the European Union, the Committee of Professional Agricultural Organisations (Copa), Christiane Lambert says in a press release “convinced that there cannot be strong agriculture without strong industry».
“I am proud to commit today (…) to address the challenges of competitiveness of the French processing sector and the sustainability of all players in the sector”, adds the media unionist. Christiane Lambert will succeed Martine Leguille-Balloywho had previously been a member of parliament for the presidential majority in Vendée.
Fleury Michon closes one of its factories, around a hundred jobs at stake
Historic increase in production costs
“This appointment comes in a context of high stakes for French delicatessen catering companies which must face extremely tense economic situations due in particular to the historic increase in their production costs (raw materials, energy, salaries, etc.) in 2022 and 2023”, it is underlined in the press release. In charcuterie, the happiness of breeders – prices have soared, cash flow replenished – is the misfortune of processors: pork represents half of their production costs.
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Christiane Lambert will therefore have to defend the interests of the downstream sector without irritating the upstream sector, from which she comes as a pig producer in Maine-et-Loire. Aged 63, she is in the process of handing over the farm to one of her sons. In a largely male agricultural world, Christiane Lambert was the first woman to chair the Young Farmers Union (then National Center for Young Farmers, 1994-1998), the FNSEA (2017-2023) then the Copa since 2020.
The Federation of industrialists in the delicatessen and catering sector specifies that it is bringing together 300 companies Who “employ nearly 32,000 people and generate a turnover of nine billion euros”Three quarters of French pork production is transformed into charcuterie.
