Premiers effets de la nouvelle politique des préretraites agricoles en Pologne

An early retirement measure co-financed by European Union has been achieved in Poland since 2004. It aimed to restructuring the farming sector by applying a measure inspired by modernisation policies initiated in France and Europe since the 1960's. Over 50 000 polish farms obtained this early-retirement measure between 2004 and 2006. Recent observations show the strong capacities of resistance and adaptation of the polish family-farm model within the new European context. If the number of very small farms has slightly diminished since 2005, the number of structures comprised between 2 and 10 ha has increased in the meantime, whereas this category is often evaluated as non-viable by Polish authorities. An enquiry carried in four small polish regions shows that the level of livelihood obtained thanks to both those farms and to composite incomes is comparable to the national average: this is a strong element explaining the permanence of those small and medium-sized structures. The early retirement measure drives to consolidate the peasant-like strategies aiming to maintain the economical and patrimonial role of the farm thanks to complementary incomes, obtained through both extra-farming activities and to solidarity between generations. The modification of the early-retirement measure planed for the 2007-2013 period now imposes a minimal size for the transmitted farm as well as for the farm benefiting of the land transmitted: in other terms, the measure has been refocused around a restructuring aim.