Cambios

Given the age of the informants and that part of the information was gathered decades ago, we have focused on farming from the end of the 19th to the mid-20th century.

That farming was family-run, involved all members of the homestead regardless of their age or sex and focused on self-sufficiency or at least as far as it could.

In turn, the degree of complexity being achieved by the different authorities is reflected in the extensive legislation being enacted and in the complicated jargon that the farmers have to deal with. One example is the following paragraph which explains how to implement what is technically known as the “convergence” of the latest CAP reform, which covers the second half of the present decade:

[[File:8.2_Cosechadora_automotriz_de_cereal._Argandoña_(A)_2003.png|center|600px|Cosechadora automotriz de cereal. Argandoña (A), 2003. Fuente: Juan José Galdos, Grupos Etniker Euskalerria.]]

[[File:8.8_Application_of_herbicides_in_lettuce._Argandoña_(A)_2003.png|center|600px|Application of herbicides in lettuce. Argandoña (A), 2003. Fuente: Juan José Galdos, Grupos Etniker Euskalerria.]]

It should also be noted that in tandem to the decrease in the number of people working in agriculture, groups of producers of all type have flourished and have resulted in the organisational structures of the authorities related to this activity becoming more complex.

[[File:8.4_Zizel-goldearekin_goldaketan._Argandoña_(A)_2003.png|center|600px|Zizel-goldearekin goldaketan. Argandoña (A), 2003. Fuente: Juan José Galdos, Grupos Etniker Euskalerria.]]

Food self-sufficiency has decreased in rural areas to such an extent that the percentage of food bought from the agri-food industry is increasingly greater even in the homes of farm food producers. The weight that local produce has in the food of urban areas is practically nonexistent. A widening gap with the origin of the food consumed has also been observed. The response has been to run awareness-raising campaigns among consumers to highlight the importance of locally-sourced produce and some agricultural organisations defend concepts such as the so-called “food sovereignty”.