Between restrictions and incentives: legal analysis of the reasoned agriculture qualification

What is referred to in France as reasoned agriculture appeared in the 1990s as a professional response from intensive-agriculture farmers to the awareness of farming pollutions. Since 2002 it has been the object of a self qualification procedure covering farms and products. A legal analysis shows that the mechanism corresponds to the setting up of an incentive policy in a field already covered by regulations defining legal obligations. Public authorities, combining restrictions and incentives, institute a hybrid policy the legal validity of which may possibly be questioned.