The FNSEA, France’s national federation of agricultural workers’ unions, has just held its Congress where discussions and the closing address by FNSEA President Jean-Michel Lemétayer showed the full commitment of the general trade union movement to defend productive work.  This was particularly the case on the issue of irrigation where responsible management of the different sectors and producers using water, together with their proposals, were applauded by the full range of participants at the Congress.

In this context, and on this specific point, statements made by the French Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, whose benchmark appears to be cuts made to maize acreage, were seen as quite shocking and unacceptable.  Aside from the fact that the basic argument is flawed and a deliberate confusion of issues made by linking water management and maize farming in a cause-and-effect relationship, these statements were felt as an insult to the sector and to a profession which has always had sound evidence to back its analyses, proposals and concrete undertakings.
 
Questions involved in the management of water resources will not be solved by stigmatising, or indeed sacrificing, maize farming and the men and women who live from it, together with the partners in companies operating both upstream and downstream.
 
 
Contacts:
Céline Fournier        Chargée de Mission Environnement – 06.87.61.80.48
Luc Esprit                  Directeur Général Maïz’Europ/AGPM– 06.80.31.65.45