Agrifood Brief: From food sovereignty to food security

 

Last week saw France’s agriculture minister, Julien Denormandie, step back from politics altogether after being snubbed for the role of prime minister.

His shoes were quickly filled by Marc Fesneau, who is, despite having a relatively low public profile, well respected in the field of agriculture and received strong backing from the sector.

And, interestingly, alongside a shiny new minister came a shiny new title.

‘Alimentation’ (‘food’) has been officially dropped from the minister’s title in favour of introducing the term ‘food sovereignty’.

And although the change may seem fairly innocuous, its addition and the justifications behind it say a lot about the future direction of France’s – and the EU’s – agriculture sector. (...)