For a long time, he looked at the sky in the hope that the threatening clouds would bring him this much needed rain. But the storm spun towards the mountains of Lyonnais without stopping on its meadows and its sunflowers. David Buisson embodies the sixth generation settled on this land, now too dry, in the north of the Drôme. With his father, they raise cattle whose meat is sold to local butchers. Their cows are already on hay because the grass is burnt, like in August. “Normally, they are halfway up their stomachs,” saddens this union member at the Confédération paysanne. They have given up on 60% of their first cut of fodder and expect to lose their sunflowers, half of their turnover. For non-irrigated wheat, the yield will be only 2 tons per hectare instead of 5. The readings from the weather stations that farmers consult on their phones are clear: no rain on the horizon, but a new wave strong heat. Even though, according to Météo France, “two-thirds of the country already has dry to very dry soils”. In question, “the almost continuous lack of rain since September 2021”, with a “monthly rainfall deficit which reached 30% to 40% in February and March and 25% in April”.
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Today, we have rainfall in the Sahel
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For sixteen years, Aurélien Mourier has lived with his wife on his grandfather’s farm, in the heart of what is still called green Ardèche. They make a little veal but mostly goat cheese – including the famous picodon. Only one source remains of the six he knew as a child. It has been dry for two months. In his village, over the past seven years, he has lacked a third of water compared to the previous seven. “Today, we have the rainfall of the Sahel”, worries the breeder. He assists, helpless, to the disappearance of his world, ours, the one long immutable with its seasons, its sowings and its harvests. “Agriculture is an ancestral know-how, transmitted from generation to generation,” he says. With, as a principle, a soil and a climate that do not vary. From now on, it is as if we were pioneers in unknown territory. “Instead of 100 tonnes of hay, he has just brought in 41. “Our operation is based on autonomy, adds this other member of the Confédération paysanne. But, for some time now, we have been buying truckloads of hay. On some plots, the grass is too scarce for it to be profitable to harvest it. »
On the meadows, he began to sow alfalfa, which better withstands high heat, and planted one hectare of vines. “The only plant, he specifies, which supports the lack of water. Now, with a square meter of grass, he only makes a quarter of a picodon, compared to a half a short time ago. He has reduced the herd of cows – from 30 to 20 – and is thinking of parting with some of the goats, for lack of being able to feed them. Fodder is lacking everywhere and is already beginning to be unobtainable for purchase. How, then, to provide for the needs of the three partners and the two employees of the exploitation? “And how to achieve food self-sufficiency when half of the production of certain regions is lost? he wonders. Denial, in the face of this catastrophe announced for so long, is no longer an option. But is adaptation still possible? We risk having to leave entire territories. »
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The trees are dying, the forests are unrecognizable
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In these southern regions, the drought has already upset everything, even the landscapes. “The trees are dying, the forests are unrecognizable,” says Aurélien. “The water is under pressure everywhere, in the water tables, the rivers… We are fighting day and night to save our production. Morale is not good,” confirms Jean-Pierre Royannez, head of the Drôme chamber of agriculture. The strawberries all arrive at the same time, the apricots and peaches will be ripe too early, the cherries too small. “In 2020, remembers Régis Gonnet, arborist and winegrower in the Ardèche, it was so hot that the vines were burning. In departments that we imagined less sensitive, the drought strikes just as much. In the Loiret, crossed by so many rivers, “we water at an unprecedented time”, worries Jean-Louis Lefaucheux, secretary general of the FDSEA 45. “But if I stop, I lose 20% at 40 % from production. However, year after year, we are watering earlier and earlier and we are watering crops that previously did not need any input. Its exploitation in a reasoned system – polyculture and breeding – straddles the road to Orléans. “Jeanne d’Arc has been there,” he says with a smile.
Further south, in Charente, Pierre-Louis Daniau cultivates 170 hectares. On the non-irrigated 70, it will miss 40% to 50% of its yield. His wheat has “roasted”: “the plant no longer has the capacity to carry out photosynthesis and can no longer fill the ears. Grain quality will be poor, with low yield. » This parcel will not cover the charges incurred. With what he has already used to water, Pierre-Louis normally holds out until the harvest, in July. He has reduced his inputs, kept hedges, groves, woods that provide shade and retain water, and planted fallow fields that regenerate the soil. But, he says, “wheat, rapeseed, barley will no longer be for our territories. The climate will become more tropical, with a rainy season and a dry season”. His father, president of the Charente Chamber of Agriculture, confirms: “With the rise in temperatures, evaporation will increase and we will need more water. »
Here, for generations, we have been trying to tame this resource, now an essential condition “to get by”, adds the son. Not far away, Guillaume Chamouleau sits on almost all the water management bodies in the department and even the region. This enthusiast has also put in place many tools to better preserve it. Its water consumption per hectare has fallen by around 30% in ten years. Despite everything, he is only able to get out of it thanks to a water retention created twenty-five years ago. And yet… Everywhere, the harvests have been brought forward – the hay has thus taken a month in advance. On the dairy cow farm where Margot Yonnet manages the cheese production, the drought has prevented the meadows from growing back. The decline in the quality of their hay and the change in food linked to the purchase of supplements lead to a reduction in production, in the quality of the milk and, therefore, in its processing.
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Solutions exist, but we must get out of the productivist system, cut off the heads of all received ideas
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In the cereal plains, in intensive or semi-intensive farming, as in small farms, without water reserves, without watering, the system, which until then was viable, has ceased to be so. Especially since this drought has been compounded by other crises. Agriculture is dependent on fossil fuels, and both mechanization and pumping are expensive. David Buisson, the Drôme breeder, uses 10,000 liters of fuel per year. From 90 cents per litre, it has risen to 1.60 euros today. This new expense, added to his losses due to the drought and the tripling of the price of fertilizers (made in part with Russian gas), forced him to give up a device that pulled weeds without weed killer. An investment which would have made it possible to regenerate its soils, thus to better retain water, but which, precisely because of a lack of water, it no longer has the means. The war between Russia and Ukraine, the world’s largest and fifth-largest wheat exporters, has led to an increase in its price. Not enough to compensate for the losses of farmers: some have already sold their production at the old price, around 200 euros per ton, against nearly 400 euros today. “The year 2017 is a break: it was marked by a very strong acceleration of global warming,” explains hydrologist Emma Haziza, founder of Mayane, a research center dedicated to climate adaptation. “We are not prepared for it. Our territories are becoming arid and groundwater is beginning to be vulnerable. In 2019, about twenty departments found themselves with problems of drinking water supply for the populations. It takes at least two to three years to modify a soil and optimize the use of water. We therefore have very little time left to rethink our agricultural model. ” What worry Jean-Louis Lefaucheux and so many others, who try to adapt: ”An investment is made over eight or ten years. It’s heavy artillery. How to make a 90 degree turn? »
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Week after week, in crisis meetings in the prefecture, everyone is banging their fists on the table to obtain an end to the restrictions – they already affect 29 departments – and better access to water. Above all, they see it clearly, they have become, in this new war, “the adjustment variable”. “They are responsible and victims of this model, confirms Emma Haziza. Solutions exist, but we must get out of the productivist system, cut off the heads of all received ideas. Jean-Louis Lefaucheux can still draw from the Loire, but until when? “The priority of priorities is the cooling of power plants,” he explains. In 2003, to protect them, he had to temporarily close his pumps. The watering of David Buisson is limited by a decree, but, next door, a fruit juice factory draws cheerfully from boreholes. “Soon, we will have to consume less and learn to do without a lot of things, reminds Daniau son. But we cannot live without eating and drinking. However, now, agriculture is not the priority for anyone. From now on, their ministry is also that of “food sovereignty”. In the countryside, we laugh yellow.
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Tomorrow, maybe, it will rain again. In the Drôme, in the Ardèche, in so many other corners of France, it is already too late. Everything will be sucked up by the water-stressed vegetation. In the Ardèche valley of Aurélien Mourier, where around thirty farms have gone out of business in fifty years, the last few may not survive this final drought. “Only 30% of farmers are insured against climate risk,” observes Jean-Louis Lefaucheux. But with a deductible of 25%, this just allows you to avoid drinking the cup. At the same time as agriculture, the peasants invented this saying: “As long as a harvest is not in the attic, it has not returned.” “Never has he been so fair.