Operating at Full Tilt, 1958–1968

Efforts to modernize the agricultural sector and address the Farm Problem were ramped up in the early 1960s with the introduction of the Orientation Laws. In particular, the newly created Société d'aménagement foncier et d'établissement rural (SAFER) promised to improve upon remembrement and make it easier for farmers to improve their holdings. This organization, however, proved to be highly controversial and many farmers argued that the SAFER was abusing its power to intervene in the real estate market. Both major farm unions, the Fédération nationale des syndicats d'exploitants agricoles (FNSEA) and the Centre national des jeunes agriculteurs (CNJA), joined the fray, alternatively defending and challenging the power of the SAFER. The inauguration of the European Economic Community heightened these tensions as foreign member-state buyers entered the French market in farmland, driving up prices and threatening French sovereignty.

Greening the Mainstream, 1968–1980

The success of the productivity drive led to surplus problems by the end of the 1960s. French and European policy makers demanded even greater efficiencies, largely by way of farming less land and moving into high-value low-output niche production. The simultaneous rise of environmentalism justified the removal of land from production. By the 1970s, the SAFER was overseeing the creation of nature reserves and recreational areas, while new guidelines for remembrement required environmental planning. High-value low-output production was not only adopted by the mainstream. As part of the growing counter-cultural movement, urban youth moved to the countryside to farm. As niche markets grew, thanks to a growing demand from consumers for a greener world, the Ministry of Agriculture took notice. Along with the new Fédération nationale d'agriculture biologique (FNAB), the Ministry created official standards for organic production, institutionalizing a movement that had spent several decades at the margins.

Alternative Ideals, 1944–1958

In response to the industrialization of agriculture, biodynamic and organic practices emerged across Europe. Inspired by the work of Rudolph Steiner, French doctors, farmers, and agronomists banded together in order to create the first anti-industrial farm organizations. Many of these early pioneers were drawn to alternative agriculture because they valued the purity that came with food free from chemical additives. This obsession with purity was often grounded in fascist, anti-Semitic ideology, and many of these of these early pioneers had supported both the Vichy government of the 1930s and the eugenics movement. These early pioneers included Raoul Lemaire, André Louis, Henri-Charles Geffroy, André Birre, Jean Boucher, and Mattéo Tavera.

The Industrial Ideal, 1944–1958

After the Second World War, the French Planning Office was tasked with two goals: short-term reconstruction and long-term economic modernization. At the heart of these two goals was the agricultural sector. In the short-term, getting agricultural back online would put a stop to rations; in the long-term, a competitive export-led farm sector would fix balance-of-payments deficits and fuel modernization in the secondary and tertiary sectors. Land use policy was key to agricultural modernization. In the early years of the postwar period, remembrement was the primary mechanism used to consolidate farms and improve productivity. To consolidate and increase the size of their holdings, farmers took on massive amounts of debt, betting that the new markets of European integration would improve their revenues. When it became clear that only a small handful of farmers would benefit from modernization, farm unions organized protests and the public media took notice of the "farm problem."

Conclusion

By the 1980s the French agricultural sector had become one of the most powerful players in the global food system. It was the second largest exporter in the world and its foreign-market earnings led many to refer to the farm sector as the "green petroleum" of France. Others, however, preferred to believe that French agriculture was grounded in terroir-based artisanal production, a wilful misrecognition that the state used to its advantage, marketing French foodstuffs as quality products. While quality production certainly did increase, buttressed by the introduction of such labels as the Appellation d'origine contrôlée (AOC), non-industrial production only ever accounted for a marginal percentage of total output. Caught between the reality of industrial production and a public reputation for quality output, French farmers continued to navigate the war of attrition brought on by industrialization and to resist their own obsolescence.

Tilting at the Windmills of Modernization, 1958–1968

As state efforts at agricultural industrialization increased, the network of organic farming continued to expand and the first national organic organizations were established. As the movement grew, however, it also splintered. Raoul Lemaire and André Louis moved in different directions and gave rise to two separate national organizations: the Association française d'agriculture biologique (AFAB) and Nature et Progrès. Under Lemaire, organic farming was commercialized through the Lemaire-Boucher Method, while Louis appealed more to anti-capitalist leftists, like Pierre Rabhi, who were beginning to move back to the land.

Introduction

The postwar French state struggled to find the right balance between quantity and quality in the agricultural sector. European integration and the general drive to modernize the French economy drove French planners to push for greater productivity, while simultaneously drawing on the French reputation for quality artisanal production in order to market food stuffs to foreign consumers. The end result was a food system split between the big-box food store and the open-air market. This push for higher productivity launched a wave of Schumpeterian creative destruction that put many farmers out of business. One of the most important tools available to the proponents of agricultural industrialization was land use policy. Through the consolidation of holdings, farms achieved greater efficiency while farmers were pushed off their lands.