Government policy is to stamp out cases while carrying out a cattle vaccination programme

Tractors block the A64 motorway between Bayonne and Pau during a protest called by French farmers unions in Urt southwestern France. Photo / Gaizka Iroz, AFP

Farmers sprayed manure on government offices and kept up roadblocks in southern France today in protest against a mass cull of cows as officials urged Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu to urgently intervene.

Many farmers in southern and southwest France have been incensed by the use of police force and the government’s mass slaughter policy to contain the spread of nodular dermatitis, widely known as lumpy skin disease.

Farmers have blocked roads after veterinarians on Saturday slaughtered a herd of more than 200 cows in a village near the Spanish border after discovering a single case of the disease. Police had used tear gas to clear away angry demonstrators protecting the cattle.

“New blockades are underway,” Bertrand Venteau, head of hard-line farmers’ union Co-ordination Rurale, told AFP. “It’s continuing and spreading.”

While the leading FNSEA farming union supports the Government’s strategy, Co-ordination Rurale and another union have called for protests, demanding a widespread vaccination campaign instead.

Critics say the current state approach is not effective, often destroying a farmer’s lifetime of work.

‘We are at war’

On the A64 motorway, which has been blocked since Saturday by dozens of tractors, farmers set up Christmas trees.

“We’re here to spend the holidays,” said Cedric Baron, a cattle farmer.

Around 50 farmers blocked the N88 highway near the southern town of Albi.

“We are at war,” said another protester, Cedric Nespoulos. “As long as the Government does not give up on mass slaughter, we will be here.”

In the town of Millau, farmers sprayed liquid manure on the facade of a local government building as tractors and trucks dumped bales of hay, tyres, and garbage in front of it.

Theo Alary, a sheep farmer, said the mass slaughter strategy was not working as the disease was spreading.

“Culling animals just like that, with a snap of the fingers, riot police everywhere, we’re kicking everyone out and killing everyone,” he said. “What is this?”

Carole Delga, head of the southern region of Occitanie, which has emerged as the epicentre of the outbreak, urged Lecornu to intervene to avoid an escalation.

“With each passing hour, indignation and anger are rising inexorably in the face of people’s despair,” she said in an open letter to the Prime Minister.

“It is time for you to intervene to ensure, as soon as possible, a frank and sincere dialogue with the farmers,” she added.

Delga said many French people were “shocked” by the images of animals being slaughtered.

“They do not understand the massive use of force by the police,” she said, referring to the culling of the entire herd in the village of Les Bordes-sur-Arize.

“We must do everything we can to avoid escalation and confrontation.”

Government spokeswoman Maud Bregeon said the Government opted for “the most effective health protocol” and added that law enforcement would intervene again if need be.

“Three thousand animals have been slaughtered since the outbreak of this disease, and we know that this is a tragedy,” she said.

“However, this represents 0.02% of the French livestock population and allows us to protect the rest.”

Lumpy skin disease, which cannot be passed to humans but can be fatal for cattle, first appeared in France in June.

The official strategy to stamp out what the authorities describe as a very contagious disease has been to slaughter all animals in affected herds, as well as the “emergency vaccination” of all cattle within a 50km radius.

Agriculture Minister Annie Genevard said on Sunday the Government planned to vaccinate one million head of cattle in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine and Occitanie regions.

She was set to travel to Occitanie tomorrow to oversee the start of the vaccination campaign in the region.

-Agence France-Presse