The Roquefort Files -- cont.

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Outside Magazine June 2001

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The Roquefort Files -- cont.

THERE'S A FRENCH saying that a man without a mustache is like a meal without cheese. Beyond safeguarding both of these traditions, Bové has figured out a central truth: If you're a Frenchman and you want to save the planet, talking about food is the best way to do it.

Bové's countrymen, almost unanimously, see the health hazards of foot-and-mouth and mad cow as the tip of a dangerous American-style malbouffe iceberg. Over half the food we blithely buy in U.S. supermarkets contains genetically modified organisms, most of them unlabeled. A third of our corn and half our soybeans contain cross-species genes. French food, on the other hand, has a veritable caste system of labeling—from the prestigious Label Rouge, which distinguishes the most superlative wine, cheese, chicken, and beef, to the honorable Appellation Origine Controllée, which protects not only Champagne and Roquefort, but Camargue bulls, Île de Ré potatoes, and Provençal lavender. Forget passing off a genetically modified product: GMOs are rarely grown in France, and must be identified as such. More than 60 percent of French markets have agreed not to sell them at all.

To Bové and indeed most Frenchmen, the debate is about nothing less than cultural survival: Will France become more like the rest of the world, or will the rest of the world become more like France? The European backlash against genetically engineered crops may prove futile; globalization may be unstoppable. Still, European countries are growing more nationalist and protectionist, not less, in the face of the foot-and-mouth epidemic, which is good news for antiglobalists like Bové. "We don't want a handful of farmers providing a cover of rustic authenticity by looking after a few hedges, flowers, and birds—a sort of cardboard-cutout countryside," he warns.

But if the French have an inherent distrust of inauthenticity, they are equally suspicious of showmanship. "Bové is serious, but like everyone who becomes a media symbol, he becomes quite ridiculous at the same time," says Paris food writer Benedict Beauge. "What is it Bové believes in?" asks Antoine Jacobsohn, a Franco-American who sits on the board of the Museum of Vegetable Culture, which does exist in Paris. "Targeting the McDonald's was a good idea, but...I'd like to see him promoting an image of terroir, not just destroying things." Although, thinking for a moment, he adds, "I liked it when he pissed on imported wheat."

On March 22, Bové was ordered to serve three months for the McDonald's affair, a sentence he will appeal again. For the hostage crisis, he got off with a fine of 6,000 francs, about $850. Jail wasn't so bad the first time, says Bové; the guards, unionists themselves, were easy on him, and the other inmates brought him Nescafé. "Jail is jail," Bové says from his cell phone on his way to Sweden to address its farmers' union. "If I have to go, I have to go. The only problem is that the pipe is not allowed, only cigarettes."

In the meantime his travel plans remain space-age. He planned to disrupt the Summit of the Americas in Quebec in April, then head down to Mexico to meet with Zapatista leader Subcommandante Marcos. In July, he will be at the Group of Eight Summit in Genoa, Italy, and he'll hit Qatar in November for the next WTO meeting. Then maybe West Africa, where he has fans. The sheep farmer has grown too busy to farm.

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