Healthy maybe. Quiet and perfumed, no. Life in the countryside is not always the haven of peace that pastoral poets talk about. In the countryside there are tractors roaring, roosters crowing at inopportune hours, and barns where manure is removed, which then fertilizes (and aromatizes) the orchards. And this is among a long, long line of sounds, aromas, and indecent sights.

In France, which was tired of dealing with the complaints of urban residents who encountered these problems when they arrived in the countryside, a unique law was passed. Their goal: to help newcomers adapt to the field, not the other way around.

The measure is intended to provide relief to rural areas. And for the courts.

Countryside at its purest. The new law from the French Parliament may seem quaint, but it has a clear and well-defined purpose: it aims to make those moving from cities to the countryside understand that they will have to take on what they find. upon arrival. Positive… and not so positive.

The measure limits the margin available to people who move to rural areas to complain about issues such as the noise made by cows, tractors and chickens, or the smell of manure fertilizing fields. The idea is quite simple: for the newcomers to adapt to life in the countryside. And not vice versa.

End to “abusive demands”“Those who move to the countryside cannot demand that the rural people who feed them change their way of life,” Justice Minister Éric Dupond-Moretti said when the law was introduced in 2023. He wants to put an end to “intentional lawsuits”.

Approval of the law. The measure had already made headlines at the end of 2023, when the bill received its first parliamentary approval with 78 votes in support. If it is now news again, it is because it has just passed its final vote in the French Parliament, as reported by TF1 Info; This is due to the fact that the new law, the Civil Code, so-called “abnormal vocalization problems“, “abnormal neighborhood disturbances.” The concept is not entirely new. It was already there in the jurisprudence, but it wants to go further with the new norm.

Is it that important? The fact that French legislators developed and implemented the new norm suggests that the problem this norm aims to solve is neither anecdotal nor specific. In 2023, the BFM TV network claimed that there were hundreds of farmers (almost 500) facing lawsuits from neighbors who were disturbed by noise or smells coming from their farms. TF1 Info assures that at the end of last year around 1,300 legal proceedings were ongoing in France arising from conflicts related to noise or smells in the countryside.

Éric Dupond-Moretti called it “surreal” that “the courts are clogged with arguments about cows mooing at night”. “If you don’t like the countryside, you stay in the city. If you go to the countryside, you adapt to the countryside as it is,” he emphasizes. Guardian.

famous cases. Some conflicts became so popular that they were even reported in the press. This happened, for example, in the case of the Maurice rooster, which a few years ago became a symbol of the conflict between the countryside and the city, between the rural world and visitors from urban environments.

Maurice’s name became famous inside and outside France when a group of residents of the island of Oléron, a popular tourist destination, filed a class-action lawsuit tired of the bird waking them up at dawn with its morning songs. A court rejected his complaint, and his case even inspired a law aimed at fully protecting the “sensory heritage” of rural people.

Add and continue. Maurice’s was not the only case. Also popular have been films starring another rooster in Margny-lès-Compiègne, or several retired farmers from Bordeaux who, a few years ago, had no choice but to fill their pond because their neighbors had settled in the next area over. They were disturbed by the croaking of frogs at night. In Oise, justice also forced a farmer to pay significant compensation to his neighbors for the noise and odors produced by his cow farm.

beyond the field. The new standard may not only apply to rural or rural areas. Ultimately, Dupond-Moretti insists, the purpose of the law is to define “the framework of famous art.” vibrant community (living together) respecting everyone” is a pattern that goes far beyond the countryside. “For example, I think of the pizzeria on the corner, it really produces smells and noise, but it was already there before you moved there. “first floor” he exemplifies.

The same applies to the discomfort that a farm or orchard near one’s home may cause a person before he or she moves to that area. “This is not a blank check for all neighborhood problems, but rather a commonsense measure,” adds lawmaker Nicole Le Peih, who was a key figure in crafting the law.

Of course, not everyone agrees or sees the rule as equally appropriate. According to Socialist MP Gérard Leseul, the cohabitation law “does nothing more than introduce principles that have already been established and implemented.”

Image | Strake Stijn (Unsplash)

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