Young French farmers will try to win public support for their embattled sector by turning the most famous avenue in Paris into a giant field during the coming holiday weekend in France, Reuters reported. The Jeunes Agriculteurs union, which represents some 55,000 farmers under the age of 35, will install a 3-hectare strip of grass along the Champs-Elysees on Sunday and Monday to showcase farm production from sheep breeding to crop growing. Farmers have been angered by a sharp fall in revenues and have used Paris as a stage for protests, including a tractor-led demonstration last month and an unauthorised protest in front of the presidential palace in December. The planned event, which harks back to a spectacular display organised 20 years ago in which combine harvesters cut a field of grain on the same avenue in Paris, will aim to generate enthusiasm among city dwellers more used to seeing farmers protesting. "It's about re-establishing contact with the public about what our profession is and what they want from it," William Villeneuve, president of the Jeunes Agriculteurs, told Reuters. "Do they want the cheapest products in the world or do they want products that pay producers?" he said on Friday. French farmers are also keen to garner public support at a time when the European Union is debating the future of its Common Agricultural Policy, under which France is currently the largest recipient of subsidies.
