Down with hedges, long live the flood!

View of the Bourbonnais Bocage (Allier)

In France, while a public consultation is in full swing, until December 16, on the future decree regulating the destruction of hedges, the debate is heating up: between an unfavorable opinion from the CNPN (National Council for the Protection of Nature), ecological concerns and pressure to "simplify" the rules, France is questioning the future of a hedgerow heritage of which 70% have already disappeared since 1950.

Until December 16, a public consultation is underway on the official platform of the Ministry for Ecological Transition regarding the draft decree establishing the rules and procedures applicable to the destruction of hedgerows, pursuant to Law No. 2025-268 of March 24, 2025, on food sovereignty and the renewal of future generations (the "OSARGA" law). To date, this consultation has already gathered more than 2,800 contributions, reflecting a lively debate on the protection of hedgerows, 70% of which have disappeared in France since 1950.

While the National Council for Nature Protection (CNPN) issued an unfavorable opinion, criticizing a definition of hedge that was too restrictive (excluding gaps), the automation of processing on inaccurate maps and an increased risk for biodiversity; associations are calling for a massive mobilization to strengthen protection rather than simplify it at the risk of accelerating destruction.

This draft decree concerns anyone " projecting the destruction of a hedgerow […] departmental prefects, decentralized services, and agents responsible for inspections ." Under the guise of simplifying the current administrative maze by creating a single point of contact, there is a real risk of this encouraging further uprooting in a context already highly unfavorable to the preservation of hedgerows (a network of hedges and groves). Any authorized destruction must be " compensated by the planting of at least an equivalent length of hedgerow ."

At least equivalent! That ignores the time it took from planting for them to become these living hedges. We would also like to know what is the status of the Hedgerow Observatory and more generally of the Pact in favor of hedgerows , to which the government committed in September 2023 under the banner of "France, a Green Nation" (sic ) ( HERE ).

Hedgerow replanted in Messimy-sur-Saône (February 2024). Photo F. Grassaud / France TV

The Duplomb Law (August 2025) aimed to " remove constraints on the practice of farming ." This draft decree complements the Law on Food Sovereignty and Generational Renewal in Agriculture (March 2025), particularly one of its objectives: " To secure, simplify, and facilitate the practice of agricultural activities ." But which agricultural activities?

Hedge shredded by a flail mower in Vauxrenard, Beaujolais / Photo / Collectif de la Pierre de Saint Martin

From massacre to hedge trimmer: symbolic destruction of agricultural hedgerows

Who hasn't seen a disfigured hedge along a country road, its foliage chopped, its branches cut and bristling? The hedge trimmer has been there.

From inside a tractor cab, a remotely controlled articulated arm automates the most arduous tasks, reducing manual effort. This saves time, fuel, and labor. However, when used on branches that are too large, the flail mower risks splintering the wood, resulting in shredded hedges that promote disease and wood rot.

Unless you get off the tractor, contact is lost. We are far from The Hedgerow Man , a book in which Jean-Loup Trassard describes an old man whose sole occupation is the maintenance and proper use of hedgerows: precise observation of growth promoting plant diversity, attracting birds and a whole host of small fauna; knowledge that identifies the right branches to use for making good ladders, fences, etc. (1)

Far removed from this (perhaps outdated) concern, we are no longer truly surprised by the decline in value, for some, of these hedgerows which, for others, combine biodiversity (preservation of living things) with landscape presence (and other "ecosystem" services). Yet, even in Mayenne, the Trassard region, farmers are once again considering pollarding trees – a pruning method that allows the use of the shoots for kindling ( HERE ). Elsewhere, their preservation and replanting are official objectives, accompanied by advice and descriptions of best practices.

And yet, hedgerows seem to have lost their value in the face of other considerations that completely disregard sensitive relationships and uses. Almost as a caricature, one can cite this episode last spring in the Creuse region, which resembles a dialogue of the deaf. On one side, the public authorities cite a theoretical and already strongly contested regulation, and on the other, a deaf ear to the constraints which, barring bad faith, are real. However, let's not forget the positions of the Rural Coordination, whose newly elected president calls for "destroying" environmentalists (he comes from the neighboring department of Haute-Vienne), with the guiding principle of " cultivating the land to feed humanity ." We recall the injunction "You will feed the world" and the film of the same name by Floris Schruyer and Nathan Pirard ( HERE ).

Thus, as reported by France Bleu on March 15, 2025:

“ The FNSEA and the Rural Coordination are angry. They had hoped to obtain an exemption to postpone the deadline for hedge trimming. The prefecture confirms that there will be no such exemption this year. Farmers will no longer be able to cut hedges starting this Saturday evening, March 15. […] Last year, the Creuse department was granted a one-month exemption, until April 15. This adjustment followed the heavy rains that fell during the winter. With the waterlogged soil, farmers were unable to use their machinery to trim hedges at the recommended time. This year, however, there will be no exemption for the department. Farmers who wish to do so can submit an individual request to try to obtain permission to trim hedges until March 30.”

The FNSEA has submitted a new request for a collective exemption to the Ministry of Agriculture. The Rural Coordination 23 is also threatening to simply uproot the hedges if their maintenance becomes too complicated .

Probably in reaction to the refusal of his request for an exemption ( HERE ), sent to the Creuse prefecture on March 6, 2025.

Bocage in very poor condition / Illustration / Splann!

However, the chambers of agriculture (2) seem to have in mind what a hedge is used for, when they sing the praises of the services it provides to humans ( HERE ):

"What is a hedge?"

Hedges are rows of trees or shrubs that often mark the boundary between two plots or two properties.

In the 1960s to 1980s, large-scale land consolidation operations were carried out with the aim of rationalizing the structures of agricultural holdings by bringing together and combining plots of small size or too dispersed to be easily exploited.

The objective was also to facilitate the activity of farmers by limiting their travel and adapting the areas cultivated to the scale and modernity of the new agricultural machinery.

While economically beneficial and beneficial from the perspective of modernizing agriculture, this approach has nevertheless caused several negative impacts : soil structure and quality, water management, plant protection... Thus, since 1950, 70% of hedges have disappeared from French hedgerows.

For several years, various subsidies have been available to finance hedgerow planting projects . While this momentum has indeed resulted in a proliferation of new planting sites across the landscape, hedgerows and other wooded areas currently represent only 3.6% of the utilized agricultural area (UAA) . The goal is to implement incentive policies that will further accelerate the pace of planting.

What are hedges used for?

Hedges can fulfill different roles:

• Promoting biodiversity : hedges provide habitat for crop pollinating insects, but also for predators of species considered pests: bats, mice, voles...

• Improve animal welfare by providing shade and scratching areas for herds;

• Preserving water quality by playing a buffering role in relation to watercourses (limiting runoff, retaining suspended matter, etc.)

  They can also act as windbreaks in particularly windy areas.

Hedgerows also have multiple uses . When a hedgerow reaches full production, its wood can be used to generate energy through traditional wood-fired boilers. Many mature hedgerow trees have significant potential for timber production , meaning wood used as a construction material.

How does this practice help us adapt to climate change?

There are many types of hedges , and they do not all have the same carbon storage capacity. The more layers a hedge has, the more optimized its storage capacity will be.

Thus, a sustainably managed multi-layered hedgerow in Western France stores an average of 5.90 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per km² per year. Implementing sustainable hedgerow management practices is therefore essential to address environmental and climate challenges .

The Creuse episode highlights the chasm separating a segment of the agricultural profession from ecological considerations, starting with a small farmer on their farm. Quantity, rather than quality or diversity, is the priority. Even in the Limousin region, a sunflower field bordering a small road stretches year after year: driving at 80 km/h, the distance between the edges of this monoculture is no longer measured by the number of sunflowers, but by the number of seconds between two points: 48 seconds, or more than a kilometer. It's as if the natural and human environment is being ignored: the distress of isolation (loans to repay after purchasing equipment to simplify the solitary work) is compounded by "higher" interests, demands that are not only expressed sporadically through tractor protests. They are also defended by a powerful lobby in the National Assembly and the Senate, among rapporteurs and committee chairs (economic affairs, sustainable development, etc.), often from rural areas and closely linked to the dominant unions and their productivist sectors. Some elected officials largely adopt the demands of the agricultural lobby when drafting articles and amendments, for example, regarding the simplification of environmental standards, the recognition of contested hydraulic structures (mega-reservoirs), in the name of a "general interest" that justifies the rule of the strongest (as demonstrated by the online magazine Splann , see HERE ).

These lobbies have largely influenced the drafting of the Law on orientation for food sovereignty and generational renewal in agriculture.

Let us state the four declared challenges: to regain France's food sovereignty for the defense of its fundamental interests (3) ; to train and put innovation at the service of generational renewal and transitions in agriculture; to promote the establishment of farmers and the transfer of farms; to secure, simplify and facilitate the exercise of agricultural activities . On this fourth point, the (dizzyingly long) Environmental Code is amended, in the chapter on natural heritage, creating a section entitled: " The protection and sustainable management of hedgerows ", surprisingly detailed on… the conditions of their destruction.

Petition, convention, consultation, a trap for conscience?

Some have fought to defend the transparency of information on projects concerning our environment, and therefore our right to access information held by public authorities and to participate in the development of public decisions having an impact on the environment (see the Charter of the Environment and the Report of the Coppens Commission on the preparation of the Charter of the Environment ( HERE ).

By the way, what about the proposals from the Citizens' Convention on Climate, submitted in 2020, and what about the very recent petition " No to the Duplomb Law, for Health, Safety, and Collective Intelligence "? The former has left a written record, methods, and an impact on the experience of its 150 participants (new knowledge, public speaking, and "collective intelligence"). The latter initially demonstrated the incredible capacity for mobilization in the middle of summer, with 2.3 million signatures, and the possibility of submitting the petition to the National Assembly, which vouched for it. It has followed its own institutional path, being examined by the Economic Affairs Committee (there is no Committee on Ecological Affairs) on November 5th, with two rapporteurs, Aurélie Trouvé (LFI) and Hélène Laporte (RN). How can neutrality be reconciled with appealing to the agricultural electorate? Following this committee meeting, a report was submitted to the Conference of Presidents (responsible for the agenda) to decide on a possible debate in the plenary session: an unprecedented step made possible by the 2 million signatures. At the time of writing, the debate is scheduled for January 7, 2026.

Performative engagement… on a public consultation

There is still time to react, by participating in this public consultation before December 16, 2025, by visiting the webpage created by the Ministry of Ecological Transition, where you can also find interesting documentation to learn about the case.

In parallel with this commitment, or to encourage it, the humanities organized an intergenerational writing workshop with groups of 6 people, each stanza, entrusted to two of them and read by the others, being situated from the outset in the poem (beginning, middle, end: only instruction).

"In the silence of the fields being stripped bare,

The hedges are disappearing, witnesses to a time that is wavering.

They were the green walls, the veins of the hedgerows,

Offering refuge to lives, a memory of ages.

Every tree felled, every copse left unattended,

It is a little bit of ourselves that we have come to lose in haste.

Because planting tomorrow never replaces yesterday, the old hedge is a song of history and earth.

Let us therefore, together, safeguard this fragile link.

Between nature, work, and graceful landscapes.

Let our voices be raised, let the law resound clearly:

Protecting these hairs from our fields, with light.

Isabelle Favre

NOTES

(1) Jean-Loup Trassard is a French writer and photographer, born on August 11, 1933, in Saint-Hilaire-du-Maine (Mayenne), who defines himself as a "writer of agriculture." A farmer since 1960, he has been publishing with Gallimard and Le Temps qu'il fait since 1961, after being discovered by Jean Paulhan at the NRF. He still lives in Mayenne, dividing his time between rural life and Paris. His works and themes include short texts, stories, and photographs about a disappearing traditional rural society, blending ethnology and poetry: L'Amitié des abeilles (1961), L'Érosion intérieure (1965), Territoire (1989), L'Homme des haies (2012). He has exhibited at the Centre Pompidou (1992) and elsewhere, and has literary friendships with Michel Chaillou and Gérard Macé.

(2) The Chambers of Agriculture in France are consular public institutions, numbering 89 at the departmental or interdepartmental level, established by the law of January 3, 1924, to represent and support farmers. They support farms in their economic, social, and environmental performance through training, advice, research, and development. They defend farmers' interests with public authorities, promote innovation, and manage public policies such as pesticide reduction and water management. At the regional and national levels (Chambers of Agriculture France), they coordinate these actions and issue expert opinions. Elected every six years by 3 million agricultural stakeholders (farmers, employees, landowners), they comprise approximately 4,200 elected members and 380 national staff.

(3). See "Farm France", "food sovereignty" and peasant agriculture", on the humanities, March 5, 2024, HERE