While the Breton drizzle grimaces this Wednesday, September 25, Jean-Marie and Louison Levrard detail the hemp and buckwheat plants on display in Retiers (Ille-et-Vilaine). The La Tierra es Nuestras fair has just opened, the largest in the country dedicated to organic farming professionals. Thus, the 57-year-old rancher and his 24-year-old son wander in search of new practices and technologies. The Levrards would like to try their hand at agroforestry and making bread that is sold locally: “We must continue to believe in organic farming even if the environment is gloomy. Currently, some farmers sell their organic production cheaper than conventional ones…”
Around him, the operators repeat the same thing: “Don’t give up” Although organic farming is going through a ” crisis ” more or less brutal depending on the sector. The tension is strong here in Brittany, where productivist agriculture calibrated to produce food for 22 million people has long hindered the arrival of organic. Currently, almost 15% of farms are certified.
“Last decade we developed with the impression of advancing in the direction of history as something natural. “Suddenly we went from 10% annual growth to a drop of five points”laments Ludovic Massard, a rancher from Morbihan and administrator of Biolait, a professional organization that brings together 1,200 ranchers. Due to the lack of sufficient points of sale, members now sell 30% of their production in the conventional network.
Generalized “shortness of breath”
The situation is similar for pork producers. For two years, several animals raised on straw, which normally sell for four euros per kilo, have been sold at half the price of pigs from surface farms. Jérôme Jacob, farmer from Quimper and president of the Brittany organic meat group, confirms this: “We also reduced our production by 30%, we saw young breeders stop and we rejected the membership of new farmers so as not to endanger our organization. » A shame in a region that produces six out of every ten French pigs and where conventional farmers, overwhelmed by the demand for meat, have been prospering in recent times.
Under a tent located in the heart of the fair, the results of the sector for 2023 are projected for the first time. The public, mainly Breton, closely observes the regional representations, which are consistent with “difficulty breathing” general observed by the Organic Agency. In Brittany, 240 organic farmers will be established in 2023, mainly in the horticulture sector. New arrivals were almost double in 2016. Professionals “converted” have disappeared from the data. Among the 178 professionals who have not renewed their organic certification, 40% continue their activity in the dominant model, particularly poultry farmers.
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