« French Badger Office. » « We no longer want cowboys in our countryside. » « OFBthe manure. » The act II Agricultural mobilizations began Monday, November 25. Among those designated as culprits: the free trade treaty between the European Union and the Mercosur countries, the low prices and agricultural incomes and… the French Biodiversity Office (OFB), whose 1,700 inspectors ensure compliance with environmental regulations.
November 20th, « a tractor drove into a service vehicle occupied by two officers »reported the SNE–FSU in a press release. The day before, around thirty demonstrators from the Rural Coordination forced the doors of a building of theOFB in Guéret (Creuse). On the 18th, demonstrators built a concrete block wall in front of the entrance to the offices of theOFP in Beauvais (Oise) and dumped bins of tires and manure. These acts of violence are the latest in a long series. One of them could have cost the life of the departmental director of theOFB of Tarn-et-Garonne, who discovered one of his car wheels unbolted after leaving a meeting organized at the chamber of agriculture.
L’OFB was the target of thirty-six actions in the first half of 2024, and an additional eight in October. In mid-November, she announced that she had filed around fifty complaints.
The government listens to the majority unions
The FNSEAYoung Farmers and Rural Coordination, the three most vocal unions in the current agricultural mobilization, denounce unbearable pressure of control and excessively severe sanctions. Several members of the government, anxious to calm the anger of farmers, followed suit. However, we are far from an ultra-powerful brigade. The interministerial mission launched at the start of the year by Gabriel Attal herself noted « a significant gap between farmers' feelings of high control pressure […] and the reality of the controls carried out on agricultural operations ».
Regardless, on November 11, the Minister of Agriculture Annie Genevard announced on France 3 that the agents of theOFB should soon hide their service weapon so that it is not « provocative ». A few days earlier, the Ministries of Agriculture and Ecological Transition entrusted their respective inspection bodies with « mission flash » for one « improvement of relations betweenOFB and the agricultural world ». With potentially fewer resources, since the Finance Committee adopted an amendment on November 19 providing for a reduction of 15 million euros in the subsidy toOFB.
One of the missions of theOFB : identify violations of the Environmental Code, such as the spreading of pesticides within 5 meters of a watercourse.
© Louisa T. / Reporterre
Announcements of this type have been coming one after the other since the beginning of the year. « Do you really have to come armed when you come to check a hedge? ? »questioned Gabriel Attal on January 26 during a trip to a farm in Haute-Garonne.
The prefects scold the agents
Among the former Prime Minister's recommendations for « reduce the pressure » ? Place office missions « under the supervision of the prefects ». At the start of 2024, the latter asked the agents of theOFB to lift your foot. With the consequence of a drop of 68 % of administrative controls and a third of judicial investigations in the first half of 2024, compared to the first half of 2023. In May, the agricultural unions obtained that agents wear an on-board camera and the creation of an internal control body, on the model ofIGPN for the police.
Parliamentarians The Republicans (LR) were quick to outbid. On September 25, an information mission on theOFB led by the senator (LR) du Var Jean Baci presented a series of recommendations calling into question the legitimacy of the office and contributing to its weakening: « discreet port » of weapons, decriminalization of certain environmental offenses, « rebalancing of missionsOFB for the benefit of prevention »etc.
Read also: L’OFB placed under supervision: The agents will become the prefect's puppets »
Himself a farmer, the senator (LR) of Haute-Loire Laurent Duplomb bluntly pleaded for the removal of theOFB in a bill presented on January 24.
Unfair stigma
The unions of theOFB strongly denounce what they perceive as unfair stigmatization. L'OFB has two missions, wrongly called « control »which concern all users of nature. The first is an administrative control mission entrusted by the prefect: for example, checking that all residents and users of a territory are complying with a drought order restricting the use of water. The second is a judicial police mission, carried out under the authority of the public prosecutor, which consists of detecting violations of the Environmental Code: spreading of pesticides within 5 meters of a watercourse, drainage a wetland, etc.
The annual reports show that we are far from harassment. « In 2023, of the 21,635 administrative controls carried out by theOFBonly 2,759 concerned farmers, or less than 13 % of cases. At this rate, with an average of seventeen agents per department, the management ofOFB estimates that a French farmer risks being inspected once every one hundred and thirty years »indicates theEFF–CGC. In terms of judicial controls, the union has identified 1,273 procedures concerning the agricultural world in 2023, or 13 reports per year and per department on average.
« That's a lot of rankings without follow-up »
It is also not theOFB Who « torn » the farmer in trouble with the regulations. « We interview the farmer and draw up a report. It is the public prosecutor who decides what action to take. »explains to Reporterre Eric [1]head of theOFB in a department of the Massif Central.
He observes that the magistrate who heads the prosecution is generally lenient: « Since I was atOFBthere were zero procedures where the farmer went to a hearing. There were almost never any fines. It's a lot of dismissals, a lot of reminders of the law, a lot of alternatives to prosecutions with requests for restoration, which restorations are rarely carried out. »
Legitimate controls
Same observation on the side of Guillaume Rulin, of theEFF–CGC. « Of 201 non-compliances noted on agricultural operations in 2023, 115 were resolved without prosecution, he indicates. And when farmers are fined for non-compliance with drought orders, we must see the penalties handed down: fines of 1,500 euros for farms of hundreds of hectares. »
The agents interviewed by Reporterre insist on the legitimacy of the controls carried out. « If the rules for using phytosanitary products are not respected, this leads to pollution and the closure of drinking water catchments, or even a reduction in insect populations with a reduction in flower fertilization,recalls Adèle [2]agent of theOFB and representative SNE–FSU. « Water and air are common goods, no one is supposed to appropriate or degrade them. »
Guillaume Rulin also sees it as a way of protecting the most virtuous farmers. « Enforcing regulations means ensuring that no one cheats and that everyone is treated fairly. » Numerous offenses have also been noted by theOFB following reports made by individuals and sometimes even farmers.
Read also: In Brest, agents of theOFB sacrificed by the state
The vast majority of farmer checks go rather well, according to the agents interviewed. « Often better than with the world of hunting or drivers of motor vehicles in natural spaces »specifies Benoît Pradal, secretary general of Snape-FO.
Good practices and kindness
L’OFB has long adopted a range of good practices to pacify its relations with the agricultural world. « When we notice an infraction by a farmer, we see with the DDT if he has already been checked, if he is doing badly, and we discuss it with the prosecutor. We try not to add problems to problems »says Adèle. In the department where Eric works, theOFB never intervenes on Sunday, except in cases of serious pollution, to « to leave [les agriculteurs] quiet » that day. « When we have to interview a farmer, we wait until he has finished his harvest, we ask him when he is free and we offer to see him in the gendarmerie closest to his home rather than in the departmental offices of theOFB to save him long journeys »he testifies.
The checks with the farmers are going rather well, “ often better than with the world of hunting » for example, according to the secretary general of Snape-FO.
© François Laurens / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP
Guillaume Rulin believes that theOFB is above all the victim of exploitation: « As the elections for the chambers of agriculture approach, theOFB is used as a release by a minority. It's who will show the strongest actions to recover the most angry and desperate farmers. »
This, under the complacent gaze of part of the political class. « I am a project manager on migratory fish and when, in meetings, I warn about the disappearance of lampreys and salmon, I am called an activist. Among politicians, we are in a populist system mixed with ignorance and climate skepticism, where we brush aside problems so as not to annoy people. » Rather than solving the real problems – agricultural price crisis, water pollution and climatic hazards.
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