Rodez. “Optimistic”, Damien Lacombe leaves Sodiaal

the essential
After ten years at the head of the board of directors of Sodiaal, Damien Lacombe handed over to Jean-Michel Javelle at the end of a general meeting where the prospects for the leading French dairy cooperative were “encouraging”.

It has now been a decade since Damien Lacombe was at the head of the board of directors of the first dairy cooperative in France, the 3rd in Europe, Sodiaal. With more than 15,000 breeders and more than 8,500 farms spread across 72 departments, including 400 in Aveyron, which can rely on three main brands such as Candia, Yoplait, or Entremont, and around twenty others, the cooperative enters into a new era with the appointment of Jean-Michel Javelle, breeder in the Loire and who was until then vice-president of the board of directors.

“I am handing over with confidence, the cooperative is in good hands, with a promising future. The outlook is encouraging.”underlines the breeder from Camboulazet who will now focus on passing on the family farm to his son. For a decade, Damien Lacombe has been working in this way “improve the income of farmers while over all these years, the sector has been shaken by numerous crises”.

“A daily job”

The war in Ukraine, which disrupted prices, the health crisis linked to Covid-19, even further, the end of milk quotas, etc. “We were able to overcome these crises thanks to the structure that we have put in place over the years, in particular by modernizing our production tools”says Damien Lacombe.And what we continued by purchasing brands, such as Yoplait in 2021, which today make it possible to offer added value to our breeders. It’s an everyday job.”

“But after ten extremely difficult years for producers, with permanent deflation, we are finally releasing value that returns to farms,” he congratulates himself. Then, with the implementation of the various Egalim laws, the holding of general states of food, “we were able to find a new balance in relations with distribution. Even if nothing is certain and we must continue to defend prices”adds Damien Lacombe.

Globalized market

For the Camboulazet breeder, “the challenge of generational renewal remains to be met and, above all, it will determine the agriculture of tomorrow”. An agriculture for which the cooperative model remains “the right one to meet the demands of a globalized market. In the future, the cooperative will also have to meet the challenge of sustainability, reducing the carbon footprint of farms. Moreover, we offer our help to breeders to reorganize their farms to meet these new demands.”

Work already underway with the final objective of a 30% reduction in the volume of carbon emissions on member farms.

Damien Lacombe thus sees “an increase in milk consumption worldwide, of the order of 3 or 4%, while production is stagnating. Breeders will have opportunities for development, we must remain optimistic for the future. And everyone must pull in the same direction, whether it is the unions or the cooperatives.”