In Vendée, Rural Coordination is carrying out an operation to control the origin of meat at the toll booth

The night is still heavy this Monday, December 2, 2024, when a small group of people gather near the Essarts-en-Bocage tollbooth (Vendée). Yellow caps stamped “CR” on their heads, for Rural Coordination (an agricultural union, Editor's note), these farmers are preparing to carry out an operation to control the origin of meat and health standards. “We will inspect the meat delivered to businesses in the area , explains Patrice Bétard, president of CR85. With this action, we want to raise awareness among consumers, to explain to them that the meat arriving from foreign countries does not meet the same standards as that which we produce here. »

On paper the action is simple: refrigerated trucks passing the toll are intercepted and their contents examined by the farmers present. Except that for many minutes, no carrier on the horizon. “It’s very quiet. If in fifteen minutes we haven't caught anything, we'll go…