Fruit producers in France have questioned the efficacy of president Nicolas Sarkozy's attempt to resolve farmers' economic woes by reducing retailers' margins, according to Végétable.
The FNPF, the national federation of fruit producers in France, believes that the link between supervising margins and fairly rewarding producers is illusory.
'Producers do not want to be held responsible for this move in the future, nor do they want to stop companies making profits that allow them to invest in the future,' the FNPF stated.
The FNPF said that it favoured agreements based on trust and ethics, beginning with an income higher than the cost of production.
The federation also recommends that selling at a loss be forbidden, that the criteria defining the state of the crisis be revised, that discounts be abolished, that contractualisation be generalised, and that distortions between imported and home-grown products be removed.
