2023-11-15 11:25:00
80 million euros: this is the government’s promise to help farmers affected by the succession of storms and floods which have hit the North and West of France in recent weeks.
This fund « will make it possible to cover both harvest losses, but also investment losses which would not be covered by insurance subjects”, said the Minister of Agriculture, Marc Fesneau, at the microphone of France Info this Wednesday, November 15
“We created a fund that allows us to avoid (…) holes in the racket” in dealing with the damage, he added. The day before, on X (formerly Twitter), the minister had indicated that this fund aimed to “support farmers in purchasing equipment and supporting cash flow”.
The farmers concerned are those located in Brittany, Normandy and Hauts-de-France. Storms Ciaran and Domingos, then the precipitation which caused rivers to overflow in Hauts-de-France, severely affected these professionals, who had greenhouses torn away, flooded buildings or crops under water.
Farms still flooded in the North
Farmers in Hauts-de-France still have their feet in the water. The Minister of Agriculture indicated this Wednesday that” one hundred “ of farms in the north of France have “buildings flooded, but there are also flooded lands, flooded crops”. He also clarified that « 200 bovins » have perished, “drowned by the too sudden rise in water” and that there was, undoubtedly, “several thousand hectares” of sugar beet crops which “cannot be harvested”. “From the recession, we will have a more complete vision of the extent of the damage”, underlined Marc Fesneau.
If it does not rain this Wednesday morning in Pas-de-Calais, the department once more suffered heavy precipitation on Tuesday. However, it returned to orange alert for floods. Numerous pumping operations are carried out, including five large capacity pumps, to try to evacuate the water.
50 million for the municipalities
President Emmanuel Macron visited Pas-de-Calais on Tuesday during a trip with certain ministers, including Marc Fesneau. In addition to the announcement of this “exceptional fund” for farmers – then without specifying the amount – the Head of State promised the release of another envelope, of 50 million euros, intended to “support the most affected municipalities”.
“It won’t be enough”tackled this Wednesday on France Bleu Nord the PS president of Pas-de-Calais, Jean-Claude Leroy, specifying that the department had for its part “provisioned 10 million”. “But once more, that won’t be enough,” he pointed out.
The recognition of several municipalities in the Nord and Pas-de-Calais as being in a state of natural disaster was also published this Wednesday in the Official Journal, the first step towards compensation for the victims. President Emmanuel Macron confirmed this recognition on Tuesday for 244 municipalities, i.e. 214 in Pas-de-Calais and “around thirty in the North”. The insurance companies are committed to demonstrating “very high responsiveness”indicated the head of state.
According to the prefect of Pas-de-Calais, Jacques Billant, 5,000 homes were affected by these floods “exceptional” et “1,400 people evacuated” since November 6. It is in any case “really much too early” to quantify the cost generated by these floods, warned Florence Lustman, the president of France Assureurs, on RTL on Tuesday. On Monday, this federation bringing together French insurers estimated the cost of storms Ciaran and Domingos at 1.3 billion euros.
On the human side, the toll of the floods in Pas-de-Calais remains “four lightly injured”. A sixty-year-old woman was found dead on Saturday in Bailleul (North) in her damaged car in a flooded ditch, with no certain link to bad weather, according to the Dunkirk public prosecutor’s office.
Anger in Brittany
Marc Fesneau is now expected in Brittany on Thursday and Friday. “We will be attentive to the announcement of compensation commensurate with the considerable damage,” warned in a press release the Nupes MP from Finistère, Mélanie Thomin, who criticizes the executive for having “broke his promise”.
In Brittany, at the beginning of November, Emmanuel Macron assured that the state of natural disaster would be activated “wherever we can do it”. But unlike Hauts-de-France, no Breton municipality has been classified as a natural disaster on the grounds that wind-related losses do not fall under this regime, unlike floods, explained the president of France Assureurs on Tuesday .
“This will not prevent risks or damage from being covered in Brittany too” via the agricultural disaster system, “it’s just not the same mechanism”, assured the Minister of Agriculture this Wednesday morning.
(With AFP)
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