France

The activities of the PPAL Network in France are mainly in the Overseas territories, particularly in Guadeloupe. Once a French colony, Guadeloupe is now a full-service department of France and an administrative region (a region known as a "single-departmental region") with the status of Department-Region of Overseas (DROM). Within the EU, it enjoys the status of Ultra Peripheral Region (RUP) which allows it to benefit from a set of Policy measures aimed at allewaying its "structural" handicaps (remoteness and difficulties of access to the island, narrow market, exposure to natural hazards). Like other regions of France, it also benefits from national and local policies.

EU policies, which are part of the general framework of public policies interfering in the food system in Guadeloupe, concern cohesion policies (regional development and employment), customs and trade, taxation, free zones, agriculture and trade regulating the conditions of supply of raw materials and consumer goods of basic necessities.

The European framework is adapted to the situation of Guadeloupe's RUP: the rules for aid and conditions for access to EU structural funds and horizontal programmes are set out as needed with special envelopes under the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Social Fund (ESF). Guadeloupe also benefits from specific measures funded by other funds dedicated to agriculture and food: the European Agricultural Fund of GArantie (FEAGA) and the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (FEADER). These funds are mobilised as part of the implementation of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and offer aid, including price controls and production subsidies. The measures are divided into two "pillars": 1) the Special Options programme for Remoteness and Insularity (POSEI) funded by FEAGA, which aims to support the production and processing or sale of agricultural products (direct payments to farmers, especially in the banana and cane-sugar-rum sectors), 2) the regional Rural Development Programmes (PDR) (Guadeloupe rural development programme and St Martin , PDRG Sm) funded by FEADER, which aim to help regions meet economic, environmental and social challenges and complement the IEHS, which are the most substantial in terms of the amount of public supports.

However, the State remains the linchpin of agricultural and food interventions in Guadeloupe, which are a translation of European policy in line with national priorities and with regional inflections. The 2014 Law of the Future for Agriculture, Food and Forestry is the framework of French agricultural and food policy that applies in Guadeloupe and is based on the measures planned under the implementation of the CAP, but also on other specific national measures financed by the French budget: aid to farms and industrialists, financial support to companies affected by natural disasters , aid to producer groups, etc.

Other public policy documents complement the French general framework on agriculture and food: (i) the Global Action Plan for Agroecology; (ii) the EcoPhyto Action Plan (French version of the EU Directive 2009/128 on "sustainable pesticide use"); (iii) the Ambition Bio 2022 Programme (promoting environmentally friendly production methods, ensuring high standards of animal welfare, preserving biodiversity; iv) the National Environmental Health Plans (NSP); v) the Agricultural and Food Balance of Trade Relations Act and Healthy, Sustainable and Accessible Food for All (EGalim), and vi) the National Food Programme (NAP), which, together with the National Nutrition Health Programme (PNNS), is the main tool of the government's national food and nutrition policy for 2019-2023. One of the main features of the ANP is the Territorial Food Project (PAT). Finally, vii) the National Food Aid Programme (NAPP) complements the ANP and the European Food Aid Programme for the Poor (PEAD).

Activities in Guadeloupe focus on: 1) the roles of family farming in the local food system y 2) the role of local actors in instruments to reduce pesticide use