punch action by farmers at a Lactalis site

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Smoke bombs, yellow flags, banners… Friday October 18, 2024, at the end of the morning, the Peasant Confederation led a punch action in a site of Lactalis in Ille-et-Vilaine.

It was in Retiers that the union, its supporters and breeders mobilized to denounce the recent announcements by Lactalis to stop the collection of 450 million liters of milk in the Pays de la Loire and the Grand Est, as well as the collection stop of 26 organic producers in Brittany.

A decision that outrages breeders.

Protesters enter the site

The forty demonstrators first arranged to meet a few hundred meters from one of the agri-food giant’s largest collection and processing sites.

Then, they entered the site and set up a barbecue, tables, and also banners in a few minutes. It read: “Rousseau dreamed of it, Besnier did it. Another 1,000 peasants on the brink” or “Lactalis smokes us out”.

Arnaud Rousseau is the president of the FNSEA and Emmanuel Besnier is the boss of the Lactalis group.

“Lactalis smokes us and smokes us by making rain or shine by unilaterally deciding the fate of the peasants. This multinational is making opaque margins on our backs while milk consumption increases. It’s the symbol of our income going up in smoke on the altar of profitability,” explains Charlotte Kerglonouco-spokesperson for the Ille-et-Vilaine Peasant Confederation.

For the latter: “Following the end of the milk quotas imposed on Europe in 2015, the public authorities, hand in hand with the FNSEA, abandoned the tools for public management of volumes. They abandoned the producers in the face of the industrial giant. »

“The situation we are in is dangerous”

Among the demonstrators, we also found Florian Morin, a milk producer based in Fontaine-Couverte (Mayenne) since 2022. The 31-year-old breeder took over his parents’ farm. He has around forty cows.

Its milk has been collected for several years by Billet. This company represents a quarter of production in France, with 270 million liters in 2023.

But before Biolait, his parents were at Lactalis.

“The situation we are in is dangerous and harms the most isolated breeders who risk not finding a dairy to sell their milk within the notice periods for termination of contract which are set at 12 months. This decision is all the more unfair as the breeders are silenced. »

For Florian Morin: “The system advocated by Lactalis is based on the profitability of breeding with ever larger and more intensive systems. The group lets its breeders die. »

Ludovic Billardhe is an organic producer in Côtes-d’Armor and a member of the Confédération Paysanne. For him, Lactalis’ decision is incomprehensible when consumption of dairy products is increasing.

“The less they collect, the better it is for Lactalis. Their only leitmotif is economic profitability. They built their fortune on the backs of peasants. Lactalis wants to supply milk from countries with advantageous social and tax conditions. We do not want this agricultural model which undermines peasant agriculture. »

“Enough of the scorched earth policy and the deadly policy that is making the peasants die. It’s a chopping block for livestock breeding and agriculture in general,” adds Stéphane Galais, breeder in Ille-et-Vilaine and national secretary general, in charge of the livestock division at the Confédération paysanne.

All these demands must be explained to Prime Minister Michel Barnier during a meeting on Tuesday October 22.

At the time of publication of this article, the Lactalis group had not reacted to this union action.

The action on the Lactalis site in video

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