the essential
After statements deemed insulting by farmers, around thirty members of the Rural Coordination demonstrated in front of the OFB in Toulouse during the night from Saturday to Sunday. Tension is rising a few days before the agricultural elections.
“We have the feeling that what the farmers want is to no longer see us on their farms. It's the same as if the dealers asked the police to no longer come to the cities to prevent the deal.” This sentence, pronounced on France Inter by an agent of the French Biodiversity Office (OFB), triggered the fury of farmers. This was all it took to provoke a new mobilization, particularly in Occitania, a few days before the end of the elections to the Chamber of Agriculture.
Also read:
Agriculture: “Together, let's win our freedom”, the rural coordination presented its list for the elections of the chambers of agriculture of the department and the region
A symbolic mobilization
Consequently, this Saturday evening around thirty farmers from the Rural Coordination, coming from Haute-Garonne, Gers and Tarn met in front of the headquarters of the French Biodiversity Office (OFB) in Toulouse, district Empalot. After 11 p.m., the first farmers, yellow caps – marked CR – screwed on their heads, disembarked without tractors or manure. But on the small Iveco flatbed truck and in the utility vehicle accompanying it were bags of flour. At the head of the small group, Lionel Candelon, the president of the Occitanie Rural Coordination, determined to mark the occasion. “This sentence doesn't get through,” says Marius, the Tarnes head of the agricultural union, “we are compared to thugs, coming from a state service it's unacceptable, so we came to give them the white powder that we produce: flour.”
-
DDM – LAURENT DARD
Under the gaze of the police, who came to contain possible disturbances of public order, the angry farmers threw dozens of bags of flour and eggs at the entrance to the administration site. Then symbolically sealed the entrance gate, using concrete irons and a welding station. On the ground, a tag: “The dealers kiss you”. “Farmer is a profession, dealer is being outside the law, recalls Sébastien an activist, we are fed up, environmental rules are becoming more and more restrictive and we don't need the people of the OFB, firecracker in the belt, to control our actions.”
Two other agricultural unions, FDSEA and JA, must also mobilize in front of the OFB in Toulouse this Sunday evening, in a form of pre-electoral bidding war.
France
