In US 83% of cultivated areas are occupied by just five crops: wheat, barley, corn, rapeseed and sunflower. This predominance of a handful of plants does not effectively reduce our dependence on pesticides and mineral fertilizers.
Among the existing solutions to diversify our agriculture, are you familiar with minor crops, namely those that cover less than 20,000 hectares in France? This is the case for chickpeas, square peas or squash, which could, if we developed them further, bring diversity back into our landscapes and improve the sustainability of our agriculture.
Indeed, a greater diversity of cultivated species makes it possible to break the cycle of weeds, diseases and pests, to limit their occurrence and therefore the use of pesticides. In addition, when the new crops are legumes or other crops with low nutrient requirements (for example, millet), they require little or no nitrogen fertilizer.
For the time being, unfortunately, a socio-technical lockdown is constraining the large-scale deployment of these minor crops. But collective catering could play a leveraging role.
Crops shunned by the sector and consumers
If these minor crops are struggling to find a place, it is because the entire agricultural sector (agronomic research, training and support for production, varietal selection and seed production, agricultural production, collection, processing and distribution of products) is in fact organized around a few crops.
Breeders have abandoned minor crops due to a lack of sufficient market, preventing any large-scale genetic progress. Farmers, like the advisors who accompany them, have often not been trained and do not have the custom and the benchmarks to cultivate them.
As for storage organizations such as cooperatives, they rarely collect small quantities because they favor economies of scale. Finally, consumers are not used to buying, cooking and eating them either.
Collective catering, a powerful lever?
As we have shown in a previous article, it is possible to initiate a movement towards sustainability regardless of the collective restaurant model, from a few dozen meals per day to several thousand, in an on-site kitchen or in a central kitchen.
This involves, in particular, more sustainable procurement practices, both in terms of the range and the production method of the ingredients purchased. So, of course, collective catering with its 3.5 billion meals per year will not save French agriculture, but it can be a formidable lever for developing minor crops in the fields and on plates.
To achieve this, the selected minor crops must have agronomic and environmental benefits, without generating too many work constraints for farmers and cooks, and without disturbing the texture and taste of the dishes for the guests.
Three scenarios for chickpea, millet and squash
In a study, we assessed the additional areas that would be necessary if collective catering more systematically integrated products from minor crops.
We selected three relatively easy-to-grow minor crops – chickpea, millet and squash – and an organic production method. We considered that chickpea flour, millet and squash, 3 products that are easy to work with in the kitchen, were introduced as a partial substitute for products from 3 major crops: soft wheat flour, durum wheat semolina and potatoes. With collective catering cooks, we defined a substitution rate of 30% that did not cause any preparation, taste or texture problems for guests.
We then explored three scenarios:
- modest integration: products from minor crops are incorporated into a single recipe for a single component of a meal (i.e. a starter, main course or dessert) served once every 20 days;
- medium integration: minor crop products are introduced each time the reference food is used, i.e. in several components of the meals and several times per 20-day cycle;
- strong integration: this scenario completes the previous one by adding products from minor crops in still unusual preparations.
Chickpea or millet flour in semolina
By substituting organic chickpea flour for 30% of wheat flour, with a piece of cake served every 20 days in canteens, nearly 900 additional hectares of chickpeas would be needed in France. Systematically replacing 30% of wheat flour with chickpea flour in starters, main courses and desserts would require an additional 4,000 hectares, or about 1/5 of the current surface area. And another 21,000 hectares would need to be cultivated if chickpeas were incorporated into innovative preparations, such as panisses.
Introducing 30% organic millet into durum wheat semolina every 20 days in canteens would also require an additional 1,350 ha of millet in France. By systematically replacing 30% of semolina with millet, more than 3,000 additional hectares would be needed, and up to more than 5,500 hectares when millet is also added to other recipes, such as cakes.
Finally, by replacing 30% of potatoes with organic squash in a soup served every 20 days in canteens, nearly 1,000 hectares of additional squash would need to be grown in the country. By systematically swapping 30% of potatoes for squash in starters, main courses and desserts, more than 3,400 additional hectares would need to be harvested. And by integrating squash into innovative preparations (for example cakes), we would need to cultivate more than 7,000 additional hectares.
Nutritional benefits too
Replacing chickpeas and millet with soft wheat and durum wheat means promoting crops that are better adapted to climate change, with a lower environmental impact, particularly in terms of the use of fertilizers and pesticides.
But the interest of minor crops is also to be found in their food contributions. Thus, the nutritional composition tables of foods indicate that chickpea flour contains 4 times more fiber than multi-purpose wheat flour of type T45 and 3 times more than wheat flour T65. Squash contains 4230 µg/100 g of Beta-carotene compared to only 1 µg/100 g for potatoes.
One of the main limitations of minor crops remains their low surface productivity, a consequence of a massive disinvestment in research and development on these species for many years. However, several calls for research projects, particularly at European level, have made it possible to relaunch work in this area.
In conclusion, this study reveals that canteens can participate in the transformation of agricultural landscapes, without generating work constraints for farmers and cooks. To move from scenario to action, it is now necessary to remove the socio-technical barriers that hinder the large-scale deployment of such agroecological solutions.
Allan is out in the field, at the heart of the action. Specializing in local reports and in-depth investigations, he has a knack for revealing the stories behind our city’s facades.
