Rural Realities | Testing Grounds for Wellbeing
The countryside is a nice place to live. Farmers are happy. That’s what we heard on the ground in the cooperative farms we visited in France in 2021 and 2022.
The countryside is a nice place to live. Farmers are happy. That’s what we heard on the ground in the cooperative farms we visited in France in 2021 and 2022.
ARC2020 and friends were in Cloughjordan Ecovillage, Ireland on March 25-26 for the annual Feeding Ourselves gathering, which takes food and farming as an entry point for moving towards fairer, more caring communities.
Beyond the classical thematic advocacy for organic farming, animal welfare and nature conservation there is a new opportunity to embrace the climate, biodiversity, CAP, job-sharing movements – and the desire to reach a humane work-life balance.
Fabienne and Sébastien opened the farm gates a long time ago. In fact, they make a point of visiting other farms, in order to respect different approaches. Their farm, Le Fournil de La Barre, is located in a vibrant territory in France’s Loire-Atlantique region.
A need for balance, a redefined social contract, and local movements inspiring and empowering other local movements has been recognized, and now it’s time for it to take root.
A recent rural resilience gathering in the Loire-Atlantique, France saw farmers, cooks, elected officials, analysts, rural activists, volunteers and others drawn from the local and European agroecology and rural resilience movements, meet to work on the future of the socio-ecological transition.
Here in their on-farm bakery, between batches of bread, Sébastien and Fabienne share their views on life as farmer-bakers.
Therefore, in addressing contemporary dilemmas, we must understand that academia, rural sociologists, architects, policymakers – and anyone who enjoys the privilege of speaking on behalf of ‘others’ – should make every effort to involve those who really struggle on the ground: the artists, the small-scale farmers, the young students, and the minorities who live precariously in rural territories.
Rural areas are wholesome spaces and only policies which take this wholesomeness into account will be supportive to rural areas where thriving societies live, work and evolve. We have gathered examples of how it works. The moment to start a new integrated rural policy is now.
Our legal status [as a GAEC or farm cooperative] allows us to do a lot of things: from growing vegetables to hosting classes, tourists, cultural events, catering… It encouraged us to open the field of possibilities. You can do things but at the same time stay true to yourself and the life you want.
For Stéphane and his associates on their six-hectare horticulture farm, GAEC Le Jardin des Pierres Bleues, every choice is calculated to yield the best outcomes for people and planet.
Stéphane loves numbers, and it’s a formula for the success of the six-hectare horticulture farm, GAEC Le Jardin des Pierres Bleues, that he runs together with three associates and one employee in Vay, north-west France.