Stéphane walks up the path among his plum trees which have lost their leaves for the winter. There are 80 hectares, planted by his grandfatherwith 30 hectares of walnut trees and 10 others of hazelnut trees. “Only productions that suffered”breathes the 59-year-old farmer. “We froze at 88% in 2021, at 95% in 2022. This year, it’s better, but we are suffering from the shortage accumulated over the last three years”. She mechanically caresses the branch of a plum tree: “This tree had zero plums this summer. This one, this one, this one…” she said, pointing to a whole row. “We can't get by. With all the credits on this farm, what do you expect me to do?”
The plum grower sells her plums at a loss. Usually, it is the 30 hectares of walnut trees and 10 others of hazelnut trees that make up for it. Not this year. “And then there are all the prices of inputs which are increasing, a small arboricultural tractor which cost 45,000 euros three years ago costs 60,000 today”. Stéphane found himself short of cash at the end of the summerto no longer even being able to pay the 62 euros electricity bill.
A cry for help in October
It was when she said to herself that she would no longer be able to pay the farm workers that she launched an appeal for help, to his bank, to the prefecture and to his union : “Stress, distress, loneliness, I'm used to dealing with that. But to suddenly tell myself that my employees have worked for the harvest, that they're going to great lengths, I feel I said: I'm going to have to tell them that it's over, that I no longer have the means to pay you.”
The fifty-year-old was accompanied, she gets help from an association“Zero cleavage”, which helps farmers in distress. It is going back on track, but the difficulties of its exploitation remain very real.
“I don’t know how to demonstrate”
Agricultural anger, demonstrations, Stéphane understands them. But she feels very far from all that : “I don't know how to demonstrate, I don't know how to block people. I'm closer to self-destructing than bothering people. And a lot of us are like that, silent, telling ourselves: it's going to stop. “The misery will end, and we will be able to rest.”
She looks at the buds already growing on her plum trees, the promise of fruit for next summer. A frost at the wrong time in Marchand everything can collapse in a few days.
