For this peasant baker from Var, the Duplomb law shows "the refusal to change practices"

From a grain of wheat to a loaf of bread. What's good for one will make the other better. Nourishing both the earth and the people who live on it in a healthy way. It all works together.

A bright morning, in a field belonging to the Arcusa family. We are in Tourves, on the lands of the Var that deserve their name of Green Provence. The bread bakes at over 300°C in the wood-fired oven.

Outside, the ears of corn are warming in the sun. On the Reyne farm, cereals alternate with plots of chickpeas, flax, sorghum, and fodder plants such as alfalfa, "rotating" with the fields left fallow.

"We don't see it as a constraint; it's something we've chosen," says Blandine Arcusa, a farmer and baker. "We have lower yields with old varieties, but making bread from our own flour allows for greater value."

Pesticides and labor law

Finding a balance, in terms of the size of your farm and its location, is precisely what requires making choices.

Is agriculture changing its practices? As the Duplomb Law moves through the legislative hurdles, the reintroduction of certain insecticides in France is looming. From here, it's a step backward.

"The three main points of the Duplomb law—neonicotinoids, thresholds for intensive livestock farming, and mega-ponds—show a refusal to change practices," warns Vincent Arcusa. "With the passage of this law, we see that we don't want to discuss it." Obviously, farmers face real obstacles.

"It's even a great hypocrisy, since the molecules are banned, but agricultural products that use them [outside France or outside Europe] are marketed in France."

But this is first and foremost a question of trade rules, like free trade agreements, past and future. "Whether it's for pesticides or labor law, there will always be less elsewhere," observes Vincent Arcusa, who is also one of the spokespersons for the Confédération Paysanne in the Var. "Should French producers fall into line?" And at what real price?

The consumer pays "fifteen times" for agricultural production, the Varois continues. "He pays when he buys; he pays through subsidies for the common agricultural policy; he pays through polluted water in the water table; and finally, he pays through his health when he is sick."

But where are the alternatives? "The demand of the 'conventionals' is to want one for one. To replace one product with another. Typically, I think that's impossible; it's a scam. You can't have Roundup [a powerful insecticide] without the negative effects."

What's at stake is a transformation in the way we farm. "The organic sector is creating an alternative," argues Vincent Arcusa. "This sector also needs help, because it's not a marginal practice."

"I see an aphid! A conventional one would be in PLS!"

Back in the field where soft wheat and bearded wheat grow together. "Oh my God, I see an aphid ," Vincent Arcusa says ironically. "A conventional farmer would be in trouble!" He looks around for a ladybug, but finds a "mummy," a sort of small, dry capsule.

This is precisely an organism that limits the multiplication of aphids. "If I spray it with insecticide, I kill the aphid, and at the same time, the little parasite that is useful to me."

To talk about these other cultivation methods is to open the first pages of a very large book. We learn that "ancient wheat grows taller" , which allows it to "win the competition for light" and to overtake the weeds that do not take over.

The risk is that the stem will bend, but this doesn't ruin the harvest. Sainfoin is rich in nitrogen and provides nutrients for planting the following year. The lower yield is offset by the consistency of a more hardy and resistant crop...

In essence, working with nature's toolbox, not chemistry. Adapting as closely as possible to each local climate.