Giving a voice to producers

In France, the Agride­main hardly needs any intro­duc­tion. Whether it’s the association’s logo on its ambas­sadors’ T-shirts on TV or YouTube, its large stand at the Salon de l’agriculture or its pres­ence at harvest festi­vals, Agride­main has taken over and expanded its commu­ni­ca­tions remit.

 “We realised that agri­cul­tural commu­ni­ca­tion was mainly done by sector,” points out Gilles Maréchal, director of Agride­main. What was missing was a cross-cutting narra­tive on agri­cul­ture and how it is changing.

Training in public speaking

Based on the prin­ciple that producers are best placed to talk about their profes­sion, the idea was born to cover the whole country with a network of 300 farmer-commu­ni­ca­tors, who are respon­sible for explaining the reality of their work to the general public. “An ambas­sador is first and fore­most someone who wants to share, while respecting a set of values,” explains Gilles.

These farmers also receive media training and training on social media, public speaking and more. Aurore Pail­lard, who has farmed 130ha of crops in Gergy since 2016, discov­ered the group through the young farmers asso­ci­a­tion, where she was already involved in promoting farming. She has been an ambas­sador since 2022. Agride­main has enabled her to continue devel­oping her public speaking skills.

“An opera singer taught us how to project our voices, which is very useful for engaging with people,” she says. The sessions also cover posture, vocab­u­lary and stress manage­ment. “When talking to a non-specialist audi­ence, we avoid jargon and acronyms. And we try not to gestic­u­late! Someone who moves around too much is harder to follow,” she points out. These training courses, initi­ated with the young farmers asso­ci­a­tion, have primarily helped her “to find speaking in front of a large audi­ence less daunting”.

Short supply chains to encourage exchanges

However, the purpose of this programme is not to create speakers or PR special­ists who will do the rounds on the radio and TV news, but who will primarily be visible across the country, in touch with the public. “The image of farming does not create itself,” insists Gilles. “It involves a lot of hard work.”

Aurore shares this view, to the point of having diver­si­fied her produc­tion to estab­lish a direct connec­tion with consumers. “’When I only deliv­ered to the co-oper­a­tive, I missed the contact with the public,” she recalls. This is what led her to plant 30,000 saffron bulbs in 2020.

“It’s a different world: One day I’m on the tractor working with a 24m boom, the next day I’m harvesting saffron by hand.” This farm product, processed on site and sold to restau­rants and markets, gives her the oppor­tu­nity to engage in discus­sion. “We start by explaining how to cook it, then we move on to how it’s grown, and often to my other prod­ucts and how I work.”

Conver­sa­tion around the plate

Aurore is convinced that the topic of food is undoubt­edly one of the best starting points for discus­sion. This is an approach that Agride­main is also imple­menting through actions like the Agride­main­Tour, which travels around the regions to spread the word at grass-roots level. “A bit like a circus, we unpack a recording studio set up in a food truck and invite along local resi­dents and elected offi­cials,” says Gilles.

The concept has been a hit, hence the idea of repro­ducing it at the Salon de l’agriculture, with the ‘table d’hôte’. Over an area of 100m², around 15 visi­tors have lunch with farmers, while a chef cooks their produce. “A three-way dialogue is estab­lished between farmers, the chef and the visi­tors,” he adds. “The general public leaves with the idea that behind every plate there is not only a chef, but also a producer.”

Agri­cul­ture in the spot­light in France

In 2020, at a time when the focus was very much on food sover­eignty, Agride­main sent an open letter to the French Pres­i­dent, proposing the creation of a National Agri­cul­ture Day. The fifth edition, last June, brought together more than 220,000 visi­tors at nearly 2,000 events. “The aim is to show that there is no single solu­tion, but that the diver­sity and rich­ness of agri­cul­ture and the agri-food industry are extra­or­di­nary assets for our country,” Gilles points out.

Aurore took part this year in Paris, where industry repre­sen­ta­tives – from seeds to super­mar­kets – met the public. The agenda featured cookery work­shops, lectures on food and more. She takes a posi­tive view of the discus­sions. “The way the public views farming has changed. The public is showing increasing interest in farming, espe­cially since the pandemic and our major gath­er­ings. They’ve come to under­stand our regional pres­ence.” 

Even so, many people still don’t have a clear opinion on farming, a situ­a­tion which, she believes, leaves room for further discus­sion. “If we don’t commu­ni­cate, others will do it for us — and not neces­sarily to show us in the best light,” she warns. Unsur­pris­ingly, the topic of plant protec­tion regu­larly comes up in discus­sions. “Some people think that we spray prod­ucts on our crops just for the fun of it. I like to break down these clichés, explaining that we think through what we do… and that no, we don’t use glyphosate on wheat that’s been growing for five months!”

Educating young consumers

The theme of this year’s National Agri­cul­ture Day was ‘under­standing agri­cul­ture for better consump­tion.’ “We launched a consul­ta­tion last year,” explains Gilles. The ques­tion of how we can we teach chil­dren to eat better often came up. Some 800 proposals were put forward, including taking school classes to visit farmers through the national educa­tion system, and having producers visit schools to recreate the link at source.

Aurore has already welcomed two school classes to her farm through the depart­mental women’s committee. She also works in schools with the ‘Tomorrow I will be a farmer’ asso­ci­a­tion. “Talking to chil­dren is one of the aspects I enjoy the most.” She had the same expe­ri­ence on National Agri­cul­ture Day in Paris: “They auto­mat­i­cally have a posi­tive image of farming. And they are very curious about where what they eat comes from. It also opens up discus­sions with their parents, who some­times known as little as they do.”