Bouaye - France
Agroforestry
This tea and agroforestry project, led by two farmers, Matthieu Desgranges and Antoine Boitel, is the result of a call for expressions of interest launched by Nantes Métropole.
2022 - 2023
Financé
This project is quite innovative: it involves setting up a tea-growing farm in the Loire Atlantique region of France. Tea plants like low limestone soils, mild temperatures and constant rainfall. Antoine and Matthieu therefore decided to try their hand at Bouaye, in the Pays de Retz, which seemed to meet the plant's requirements. In particular, its proximity to the Loire and a natural wetland reserve mean that production can be viable with sufficient soil moisture. The two young farmers set up in an agricultural zone leased by the town council, with the aim of revitalizing local agriculture.
An agroforestry system will be set up on the plot, before the tea trees are planted. It will include: 90 isolated trees in the heart of the plot (corm, elm, oak, pear, wild apple, honeylocust, cherry, hazelnut) to improve soil structure and fertility and provide protective cover for the tea bushes; 280 trees and shrubs (sessile oak, corm, field maple, basswood, black elder, hazelnut, etc.) forming hedges within the plot, to form biological corridors for local wildlife and isolate the cultivated areas from the cultivated areas. ) to form intra-plot hedges, creating biological corridors for local fauna and isolating cultivated areas like sanitary cordons; and 78 trees and shrubs (hawthorn, blood dogwood, medlar, viburnum, holly, etc.) to complement the existing hedgerows at the edges of plots. In all, 448 trees and shrubs of 23 different species will be planted.
