Agriculture: lavender, a struggling harvest – Franceinfo

Shades of mauve and purple: lavender is Drôme’s most famous beauty asset, which rivals the Château de Grignan. This year, in the fields, time has stood still. All the flowers should have already been collected. Persistent rains in early summer delayed the harvest by three weeks. The flowers are then unusable and the income compromised for the producers, again. Because last year, one of them harvested but sold very little.

“There are no foreign tourists, and most of them buy this kind of product”, explains Renaud Feschet, producer of lavender flowers. 20 tons of remains, to which can be added those of 2021, in the last empty space of its warehouse. He has already accumulated 120,000 euros in losses. In 2022, if the situation persists, he will have to give up his know-how passed down by his father 20 years ago. His partner’s fields are ready for harvest.