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Latest updates from the Chamber of agriculture of Charente-Maritime.

15/03/2020

Who are we ?

The Chamber of agriculture of Charente-Maritime (CA17) belongs to the network of the Chambers of agriculture which is, since the years sixty, an important factor in the national policy of the agricultural development. With one Chamber of agriculture for each department and for each region, it has become one of the main technical advice actors, with the farm cooperatives network. The management of the inputs – fertilization and plants protection – is a common topic of advice among all the Chambers of agriculture. Close to their territory, the Chambers of agriculture conducts many activities about fertilization management: personalized advices for the farmers, training sessions, experiments at field with farmers’ collectives…

Why participating to Nutri2Cycle ?

The CA17 is very much involved in the fertilization management:

• as a stakeholder in the translation of the Directive n° 91/676/EEC “Nitrate” into the French local regulation;
• as a member of the French Combined Technology Network “Fertilization & Environment” (RMT Fertilization & Environment – http://www.rmt-fertilisationetenvironnement.org) from 2007 to 2011;

As a member of COMIFER, a non-profit association created in 1980 to be the national center of encounter and dialogue for all individuals or organizations involved with the science and technology relating to sustainable fertilization.

Since 1990, the CA17 has strongly increased its action in the field of the effluents recycling and return to the soil of the organic matter within the Chambers’ sub-network of experts in agronomic recycling for biological wastes or effluent:

• From 1997 the CA17 has led more than 800 dossiers for upgrading livestock building and has set up for each one a plan for spreading their effluents (slurry or manure): about 20 000 ha and 1 500 tons of biological nitrogen. The CA17 brings its skills to the farmers who want to improve their effluents management to set up composting units and to monitor their compost production.
• For thirty years, the CA17 participates to the departmental strategy of recycling the urban sewage sludges. In 2013, the CA17 have hand in 21 sewage sludge recycling plans, that represents 14 300 tons of DM of sludges – about 90% of the departmental production, 2 800 ha a year to receive the sludges and 160 farmers as stakeholders.
• The CA17 has participated the recycling of extraction sediments from river and canals too from 2007 until now.
• For three years, a specialized CA17’s advisor leads the wine farms in their project of upgrading their system of effluents recycling and realizes the field data collect to build the recycling plan : about 50 farms i.d. 2500 ha a year.

In the context of the project of European regulation about the fertilizers, the CA17 proposed to join the H2020 project “Nutri2cycle” as a representative of the know-how of the French Chambers of agriculture in nutrient recycling.

Our involvement in N2C ?

In the project designing, it seemed to us that the best we could offer was our field experience and our relationship with farmers. That’s why we decided to act in the project in the works “Agrotechnical research”, “theory to action” and “Communication and community management”.

We were proposed to participate at first to the research line “Innovative soil, fertilization and crop management systems & practices for enhanced N, P efficiency and increased soil OC content” with two kinds of farm: an organic orchard farm and a farm combining livestock and agroforestry.

So we got in touch in our territory with:

• a goose breeding farm with agroforestry, at Saint Martial sur Né in Charente-Maritime (France);
• an organic vineyard farm, at Thézac in Charente-Maritime;

to make them participating to the project.

Finally as our both proposals of farm in France have their own organic effluents to manage, our expected results will be added too in the research line “Biobased fertilizers and soil enhancers from agriculture residues”.

Our first works

As we agreed with the farmers, we started our monitoring work for the 2018/2019 crop year. We began with the effluents and soils characterization and we tried to monitor via remote sensing. On November 8, 2019 we organized a presentation event of the first results about the farm with geese breeding and agroforestry – the farm « EARL Manicot »  : an open day called “Innov’action”, for the farmers, the others rural stakeholders and, to a lesser extent, the general public. The day was organized with three animation workshops focused on the circular economy: “Feed the soil in economy Circular: Nutri2Cycle project” and “Agroforestry in Charente-Maritime: fixing carbon and energy on the farm” by the CA17 and “Heating with wood: renewable energy on the farm” by  the Regional Center for Sustainable Energies.

During the afternoon, an intervention was made by Mr. Luc SERVANT, President of the Chamber of Agriculture with representatives of local authorities about farming and circular economy. About sixty people came to discover the farm and its activities.