Lhe peasant population reminds the urban world of their trying existence this beginning of the week. Less than a year after an intense mobilization, which stretched from January until March 2024, punctuated by blockades, snail operations or dumping of manure right in the heart of Bordeaux, the exasperation of farmers returns therefore sound its revolt in the metropolis in the depths of autumn. From this Monday, November 18, at the call of the Departmental Federation of Farmers' Unions (FDSEA) and Young Farmers (JA), a “fire of anger or distress” must burn with a thousand flames around 6 p.m. 30 on the Saint-Michel sports plain in Bordeaux. A demonstration which will end around 11 p.m.
Farmers: why the cup is full and the anger can no longer be contained
They poured out their exasperation and their demands at the start of the year for weeks, then they returned to the fields, loaded with promises. Ten months later, climatic and health hazards have further deepened the disarray and the dissolution of June swept away the promises. Farmers return to battle
Should motorists prepare for a few cold sweats and the return of impressive traffic jams? If the desire is not to “go and piss off the people of Bordeaux” while “French society is really on edge”, says Jean-Samuel Eynard, president of the FDSEA in Gironde, the prefecture nevertheless foresees traffic difficulties “on their entire route and in the city center of Bordeaux”, recommending “road users to avoid routes where traffic risks being disrupted, particularly in the southern quays sector in Bordeaux”.
Traffic could also be busy this Tuesday, November 19 with the action this time of Rural Coordination. A convoy of “tractors and light vehicles” is preparing to reach the Bordeaux metropolis from Créon, in Entre-deux-Mers. Considering the departure time of the procession (before 6 a.m.), there is no doubt that it should have an impact on traffic around and within the Gironde capital during peak hours, a delegation of farmers having to be received at the prefecture, in the Mériadeck district, mid-morning.
And after?
These first actions could be followed by others in the coming days. “We will talk about Act 2 in due time, if necessary,” confided Jean-Samuel Eynard at the end of last week. In the meantime, the State is active or promoting its action. Coincidence of the calendar or not, the Gironde prefecture has just announced the opening of its window for requests for subsidized loans for viticulture in crisis. In a long press release, the prefect Étienne Guyot also recalls the “concrete and [le] significant financial support for farmers”, taken by the government or in the process of being adopted. These include the abandonment of the increase in taxation on non-road agricultural diesel or the increase in property tax reductions on undeveloped properties.
In Gironde, more specifically, Étienne Guyot returns to the 18 million euros in emergency aid for viticulture and the State's participation in the various grubbing-up schemes: the “sanitary” which benefits from an envelope of 38 million euros and the “final”, subsidized to the tune of 120 million euros nationally and which must concern more than 4,000 hectares in the department.
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