With Regis Degouy of FGA-CFDT

Many jobs could be lost in the dairy industry

 

Degouy is the national secretary of France's Fédération Générale Agroalimentaire (FGA), which will be representing France in the upcoming IUF Global Dairy Conference.
Sirel spoke with him about the situation of his country's dairy industry workers.

 

-What are the leading problems faced by dairy industry workers today?

-Right now, our greatest difficulties are with dairy producers, more so than with processing plants. A complete reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is being discussed, which will radically change current regulations. In France we're facing a conflict with dairy producers, who want to maintain all the gains they've achieved in the past. This makes it very difficult for the companies.

 

-Why? What's the issue at conflict with producers?

-In France, when the economy was doing well, the price paid for milk left a pretty generous margin for producers. With the current crisis, the agriculture sector, like in other parts of the world, is forced to adjust its prices and that's what companies are demanding. But France's dairy producers are highly conservative and things aren't going very well.

 

-What's happening in that sense in other parts of Europe?

-In other countries like Germany, for example, this problem's been solved already, and producers have adapted to today's situation. In France it's more complicated because there's a  very powerful lobby of producers.

 

-Would lower prices harm a lot of producers?

-In the coming years many producers will be driven out of business, and that's a fact we have to accept, as they won't be competitive enough to remain in business.

 

-What about processing plants? How will these changes affect them?

-We fear that a lot of jobs will be eliminated, because we believe there'll be many mergers and companies regrouping, which will probably lead to a job reduction trend.

 

I don't know what's happening now with the sector in other countries, but our prospects are not very promising. In France things are really complicated.

 

-Is this the worst situation you remember the sector going through?

-Without a doubt, because in the dairy industry everything's always gone smoothly, there have never been huge concerns. But that's completely changed now.

 

-How do you plan to face this threatening future?

-We're asking company owners to let us know what their plans are, what they will do in the short- and medium-term, so that we can be better prepared to negotiate in favor of the workers.

 

In France we have the additional problem that there are several trade union federations, and we don't all agree on what needs to be done in the field of agriculture. The positive side is that a variety of opinions enriches debates and the country's social and political life.

 

-Will you be attending the upcoming Global Dairy Conference in Argentina?

-Yes. And from what I've seen from the conference agenda I think it'll be an opportunity to share our situation and, most importantly, to learn about the situation of other countries, which is something we're very interested in.