France: “You can fill your swimming pool but not… water your vegetable garden”
A decree issued due to the drought by the prefecture of Haute-Savoie unworthy of parliamentarians.
By The Editor
California 18
July 22, 2022
Excerpt:
This did not fail to outrage, the day after the publication of this decree, certain elected officials such as the socialist regional councilor and municipal councilor from Thonon, Jean-Baptiste Baud, who “seized the prefecture”. “While some families rely on their small production to contribute to their food (in a context of galloping inflation), the absence of watering risks quite simply destroying these crops, which even modest, remain useful.
And at the same time, we could therefore fill a swimming pool… ”, writes the elected official on his Facebook page. A point of view shared by the former elected environmentalist, also Thononaise, Elisabeth Charmot, who wrote to the sub-prefecture: “The swimming pools can be upgraded at night, we can water the trees which have just been planted the night, but the vegetable gardens, vital for people who have invested time and money in sowing and planting and who need them for food, could not be watered at all? (…) We are amazed that the prefecture preferred to favor swimming pool owners rather than gardeners. »
Thursday, July 21, the senator of Haute-Savoie Cyril Pellevat, for his part, announced to also seize the prefecture, in order to request a modification of the decree, which would provide for an authorization to water vegetable gardens during the night. “The cultivation of a vegetable garden is part of a responsible and ecological approach. In addition, in the inflationary context that we are experiencing, low-income households rely on the production of their garden to feed themselves and thus reduce their expenses, writes the elected official in a press release. Many citizens and elected officials tell me of their incomprehension in the face of this arbitration, and believe that it favors pool owners and companies for water use that is not an absolute necessity, over individuals wishing to use water in reasonable quantities to sustainably meet their needs. »
