Hands and feet in the ground, the inhabitants of Générac, in the Gard, plant pines, oaks, maples. This Saturday, November 26, on the site of Puech Lachet, a few kilometers from the heart of this town of 4,000 souls, they want to bring their devastated forest back to life, through a reforestation operation, called “Renaissance”. For a week, all the schoolchildren of the city came to participate in the planting. That day, it was the turn of a hundred adults, sometimes accompanied by their children, to carry out the final pickaxe moves for this first chapter (other plantations are planned for 2023).
“In ten years, my daughter will be able to come back to see her tree in the forest. She remembers the fire very well, and I wanted her to also be able to see that we can all do something for nature together.” Alexandre Roussel, young volunteer dad
In this village located twenty minutes south of Nîmes, the summer of 2019 is still present in people’s minds and its consequences are still visible. Nature bears the scars of the megafire that broke out on July 30, 2019, ravaging more than 800 hectares of woods, scrubland and vines. That summer, for almost a week, the population lived with the fear in their stomachs of seeing the flames reach the doors of the houses.
Nearly 200 people had to be evacuated. Franck Chesneau, a Civil Security pilot, lost his life in the crash of a water bomber plane. A village square now bears his name. “The shock was collective, it is a tragedy that has bereaved the town, says Frantz Verbrackel, deputy mayor responsible for the environment. And then we discovered these lunar landscapes, our nature was as if dead… With the elected officials, we thought it useful to do something to rebuild our forest. »
A complex and delicate project
The “Renaissance” project is supported by the city and the National Forestry Office (ONF), but was only able to materialize with the participation of private patrons, the companies STS Promotion and Vinci Construction. “The total cost of this first phase is 32,000 euros, sponsorship has enabled us to collect 18,000 euros”, says Frantz Verbrackel. Of the 800 hectares ravaged, the town lost 70 hectares of forest.
The reforestation operation should make it possible to reforest 20 with 3 000 trees. A complex and delicate project for a small town. “Botanical conservatories and the ONF encourage identical replanting, with local species, observes botanist Véronique Mure, who is supporting Générac in this initiative. Whereas I would be more in favor of opening the palette of new trees, while remaining in the Mediterranean environment. » And to cite as an example the holm oak, so present in the scrubland but which is suffering from climate change. “We could imagine raising essences from Morocco, Spain… But there is no funding for innovative projects”, admits the specialist, who lists the trees finally chosen, of the usual species for this territory: Aleppo pines, gable pines, Salzmann pines, holm oaks, cork oaks, fig trees…
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