"Everything is made for the cottages to disappear"
- “Leurgorri has his home in Lakarri, a small work instrument he loves and takes care of at the root. It's as hard as the little one, because it has the snacks in its chest. It cannot separate the past times in the ELB trade union and in collective initiatives such as Lurzaindia from the profession. Although he is a tireless militant, he acknowledges that the current situation is difficult: for years he has been fighting for small farms because they have no results and because the economic situation is increasingly black.”
Does a great estate need to
be repudiated?This assumption has become a consolation for men's minds. Everything is aimed at this end, even companies depend on the greatness of the treasury. But we have to look at everything, it is not true that it has always been bigger and that there is money, because by increasing we have expenses.
The ELB says that three farms have more value than a big one.
Surely we have the wealth of a village on three farms. Not only the people, the land, biodiversity, the environment, also the shops, the officers... Accelerated cultivation makes everyone reanimate.
They ensure the presence of the neighborhoods.
What is being a farmer without a neighborhood? Hooo, it's a real disease! Staying alone in your world is a delicate issue, this loneliness is what big farms deduct. They were bigger and the less numerous peasants, the smaller people and, finally, the less long life.
At ELB you have the “Low Farms” commission.
It was formed from the 2008 crisis. I don't know if the crisis already existed and it's not now, but then we all knew that it had hardened economically, that life had made us harder. We created the idea that every little boy in Ordun could survive the age of ten.
How about that?
We started with the aim of publicizing the problems of small farms, which are the ones that need it most. At the same time, they were thinking of a new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), and Romanian Commissioner Dacian Ciolos said that they should also be helped because they were the backbone of agriculture. For Romania, this was for the Basque Country and for France.
Have you heard?
It's very difficult to be heard. We tried but soon saw the lobbying work that is being done by the FNSEA and its friends. Cyolos hadn't heard either!
More and more farms are being tightened up. Later on we will have to find an empty house, a free road, rather than those that have a
continuation. Even when they can happen, a black message is sent to descendants. Succession will disarticulate more easily if it is not given hope. It's also a hope, because people still plant themselves. They are also from outside the world of farmers, but it is not easy to get something between them and those who have no succession. The farm is not just a work tool, it excites us from within, it seems to be attached to our house, to our intimacy, leaving it is hard.
Small ones have the advantages of planting.
Yes, but we need to establish a rapid policy so that they become interesting and supportive. I often feel that our work is not recognized.
It is thanks to the solidarity of both farmers and consumers.
Yes, but how long? That is what worries me! I cannot give a positive answer, I tend to think that we are impoverishing. The economic reality is there, everything is made for the little ones to disappear. You have to be very fast to resist. Politically, rapid change is needed to give hope to small farms.
You don't have a family.
Ten years ago we fought, small farms have never been mentioned so much! But there's nothing done. If 10, 20 or 30 small farms are lost each year, what would then be in Iparralde? How are we going to have the environment? Farms should be officially known, because maybe it would take ten years to arrive.
You're not the most optimistic. Always or do you have a view of the past few years?
Ten years ago I had the rapid hope, but seeing with everything we have done, that nothing has moved with the transfers to Paris, it is frankly difficult for me. From the point of view of money, the situation is getting tougher.
Are we talking about the situation among farmers?A
small cottage disappears quietly, little by little; it disappears to say “that’s right, it’s not easy on small farms.” Do we mention it among ourselves? No, that worries me. I am very proud that year after year we are impoverishing, 25 years ago we lived much better! It has to be said that I am with red cows and that we are particularly affected by the crisis.
The militancy and the collective bring you another wealth.
[Pause] It's a difficult question, and you shouldn't ask that at the moment. If they weren't collective fights, it would never come. I understood that a long time ago. But I do not know whether collective struggles will be enough to secure the future of the labourers. I do not know whether the militancy will be the same as ten or twenty years ago.
Without the trade unionism that protects young people, there is no future.
That is certain. It is already difficult with trade unionism, then without trade unionism ...
“Badakit militantziarik ez bazen izan ni ez nintzela laborari izanen. Hatsarretik ukan ditut oztopoak, plantatu nintzenean ttipi atzematen nindutelako eta hatsarretik ukan dut ELBren laguntza. Lurrentzako berdin, ez zitzaidan lan tresnen erostea posible eta hor ere, beharrik Lurzaindia hor izan nuela laguntzeko”.
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