At Groentelaar, a farm near Brussels, Tijs Boelens and Lucas Van den Abeele practice agroecology. For them, pesticides are a symptom of a larger disease that they are fighting against in practice, in the field, and politically, by creating a new agricultural union.
For his part, Martin Pigeon, from the NGO Corporate Europe Observatory, is in despair over the new Common Agricultural Policy. Will seven more years be lost in the fight against the gigantization of farms, and against the massive use of pesticides?
All depend on decisions and political developments, all feel that the change comes from the base, all affirm that Europe and the world are Emergency Zones to Transform.In the countryside of Hesbaye, residents led by Marie-Thérèse Gillet and Christian Baeke, created the ZUT, the Emergency Zone to Transform. They want a radical and definitive reform of production methods, which would dispense with the use of pesticides.