As water restrictions are brought in, farmers row over their share of the supply, finds Hugh Schofield in Paris
France is going though its worst drought in nearly 30 years after an exceptionally dry winter and spring, with more than two thirds of the country’s 96 departments imposing water restrictions. Visitors this month to large swathes of western and southern France, including popular tourist areas such as Charente, Provençe and the Dordogne, will find a ban on refilling swimming pools, washing cars, watering vegetable plots and using sprinklers on golf greens.
Farmers across much of the southwest are facing a ban or severe restrictions on irrigation, and a fierce row is brewing over the recent huge increase in maize production – that crop alone consumes more water than the population of France
Rationing has been introduced in some villages which depend on a sole – and dried-up – source , but the authorities are hopeful that early planning will mean large-scale cut-offs can be avoided. Low rainfall since September of last year has left the water table at drastically reduced levels in the western half of the country, from above the Loire estuary down to the Pyrenees. Even in normally wet Brittany, the island of Belle-Ile is being re-stocked with fresh water by tanker because reservoirs are too low to cope with the summer influx of tourists.
The southeast has also been hit. Dried-up rivers are hampering tourist activities such as canoeing and fishing, and many reservoirs are at critically low levels as water is taken to cool nuclear power stations downstream. Only the northeast and the Paris region have been relatively spared.
The environment ministry has said it is the most severe drought since 1976 – worse than the 2003 heatwave – and though there is no proof of a link with global warming, experts say the country should be prepared for more shortages in the future.
“It is not enough to save water for a month and then stop. We have got to learn to preserve this precious commodity throughout the year , because the type of drought we are seeing can only become more frequent as climatic changes take hold,” says environment minister Nelly Olin.
Amid calls for a water plan that would allow hard-hit regions to be supplied from elsewhere, there was criticism last week of a national water-rate policy that France’s main consumer group says unfairly favours maize farmers and other large users of irrigation.
According to the UFC-Que Choisir, farmers in the southwest – the area worst hit by the drought – pay six times less for their water than their equivalents in the Pas-de-Calais near the Belgian border. The rate is set by local politicians, who have close links with farming interests, and amounts to an encouragement to over-consume, the organisation says.
“Where the risk of water shortages due to irrigation is greatest, the cost of irrigating is lowest. It is perverse,” says UFC-Que Choisir president Alain Bazot.
Farmers hit back, arguing that maize does not require more water than other crops but has the peculiarity of needing it during high summer, when levels are lowest.
“To claim irrigation causes drought is heresy. It is precisely because an area has been hit by drought that we have to irrigate,” says Christophe Terrain, president of the General Association of Maize Producers.
Encouraged by EU subsidies, France produces around 15 million tonnes of maize each year – most of it for animal feed. Irrigation uses some 6.5 billion cubic metres of water, or 20% of national water consumption. The proportion taken by households in drinking water is 19%.
Drought and human negligence are to blame for a recent rise in forest fires across Europe, the EU said yesterday, warning that the situation in southern Europe was precarious. Experts say that while 2004 saw a dip in fires, this year was on track for a dramatic increase, comparable with 2003, when 740,000 hectares of forest were destroyed and 40 people killed.