Faced with the disaster that the French agricultural and wine world has just suffered, the Prime Minister announced a series of measures which represent a large-scale mobilization estimated at nearly 1 billion euros.
Emergency measures will be quickly deployed: a blank year of contributions, relief from land tax on non-built land (TFNB), mobilization of existing mechanisms in terms of partial activity and PGE. An emergency envelope will also be allocated to the Prefects to provide immediate support to the farms in greatest difficulty.
These emergency measures will be followed by exceptional measures. Compensation for arborists under the agricultural disaster system will be increased to 40% for the most significant losses. For the other sectors which have been severely affected and which are not today covered by this agricultural disaster regime, in particular winegrowers, similar exceptional support will be put in place. Insured farmers will also benefit from state support and will thus be better compensated.
While waiting for this aid which requires knowing the extent of agricultural losses, a lump sum advance based on the loss of monthly turnover will be granted. This exceptional fund will also be open to downstream companies in these sectors, which will be impacted by the absence of a harvest to condition or transform.
Finally, the Prime Minister recalled the need to provide structural responses to sustainably strengthen our agriculture in the face of climatic hazards. In particular, he asked to speed up the work on reforming crop insurance and announced the doubling of the envelope of the stimulus plan dedicated to protection against climatic hazards.
Some of these measures remain to be specified by the Minister of Agriculture, who will once again convene the crisis unit in the next few days.
The cold snap and the return of frost over the past two weeks have caused very significant damage to a large number of crops (viticulture, arboriculture, but also arable crops such as beet or rapeseed) and many regions. An exhaustive inventory of the damage is not yet possible, but it is already certain that the agricultural sectors will be heavily affected with losses of up to 100% of crops. ■