It’s barely dawn and the moos are already echoing in the corridors of the large semi-open hall. Since 6:30 in the morning, dozens of calves, cows and bulls have taken their place in their metal boxes. Unloaded on trucks from around twenty departments in the southwest, the animals destined for slaughter or the calves that will be sent to fattening are ready, parked, for the weekly ritual.
In one of the three largest livestock markets in France, every Tuesday at 8 in the morning, the “traffickers” enter the scene.. “I prefer to say merchant, horse dealer, it’s pejorative”highlights Jean-Paul Boyer, a livestock trader for more than forty years. For more than an hour, buyers, transporters, breeders and commission agents walk the aisles. Wearing their traditional clothing, a long black blouse and a cane in their hands, about 100 traders initiate transactions, often secretive.
Here we still speak in old francs and applaud to close an agreement since 1977. At the helm, David Minerva, 53 years old, mayor (without label) of Laissac-Séverac-l’Eglise, because this market belongs to this municipality of Aveyron, under management direct. From the top of a booth overlooking the market, orchestra, microphone and walkie-talkie in hand, the ballet of shopping.. “This morning we will have around 900 animals and, as always, the trucks will leave for Italy, Spain and perhaps the Maghreb.observes the elected official this Tuesday, November 19.. The profession is worried, but business is good. »
Traceability measures
A serenity that is not shared by the actors in the department at the time of the final negotiations on the treaty between the European Union and the Mercosur countries (Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, Uruguay, Bolivia). “Mercosur would be a cataclysmestimates Jean-Paul Boyer, who was president of the breeders of the former Midi-Pyrénées region. But the catastrophe has been foreseen since the 1990s: massive imports, multiplication of regulations, CAP money [politique agricole commune] that does not fit in the pockets of ranchers… our profession has suffered for thirty years. »
Since the hormonal beef scandal (some of which was sold here) and the mad cow crisis in the 1980s and 1990s, drastic livestock traceability measures have been implemented. This morning, when the animals enter, we systematically check their health passport. A card, green or pink, that mentions age, vaccination status, race, and geographic origin. An obligation in France. “We know very well that the meat that comes from Argentina or Brazil does not meet these standards, that the animals are loaded with antibiotics”says Jean-Luc Lacombe, a breeder from Aveyron, also at the head of a small commercial company.
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