This is not an idyllic job, although it may seem like it, but it is vocational, it has its good side, you are free and you are with animals, which are not as heavy as some humans”, says Joan Jordana, while distributing salt to the cows in the mountains, near Astel. Joan, 38, lists the growing obstacles that extensive livestock farming must overcome in order to survive. The endless bureaucracy and the lack of qualified labor make things more than difficult for these small businessmen who contribute to maintaining the landscape of the Pyrenees, a function that they consider should be more valued in these times when change is looming. weather and fire risk.
Cows and the occasional calf deliriously approach Joan and her assistant, Jaime, to lick the precious sodium chloride that they deposit on top of the rocks. The cattle crowd together, everyone wants their dose. When it’s over, they return to their calm routine, to graze without stress and be aware of the needs of their young. “Salt helps them assimilate food better, especially in summer,” he details.
Joan was born in Astell but lives in La Pobla de Segur, with her partner and their two children, aged four and one, to have access to school and other services. Her father, Tomàs, a lifelong farmer, and her mother are the only residents who permanently reside in this town, one of the 19 that make up the municipality of La Torre de Cabdella, in Pallars Jussà. The 23 registered, 20 fewer than three decades ago, according to Idescat data, are a mirage. Most only settle on vacations or some weekends, Joan specifies.
“I am the youngest of three brothers and the only one who continues with the family farm. Now we have 130 cows, in addition to between ten and fifteen replacement cows, which are the ones we leave with the herd when they are born, but I have had to sell the sheep, out of 600 I have only kept 38 because I have not found anyone to take care of them . My father helps me, but he is getting older, he has turned 74, and I don’t want to burden him with so much work, ”he argues.
Joan took his first steps as a cowboy as a teenager following the Jordana tradition, and at 20 he was fully dedicated to this occupation. His older brother has created a firm that sells organic meat from the Pyrenees, in La Pobla de Segur, and the middle-aged one is a pharmacist in Barcelona.
Although he enjoys his work, camping in the open air without anyone commanding him has its advantages, he confesses that if he had had the opportunity to sit for a firefighter’s competition at the time, he would have done so without hesitation. The servitude of farm tasks can be a heavy and thankless burden. “I like this but it has a point of slavery and every day we are subjected to more bureaucracy, more and more paperwork; As if that were not enough, in the 18 years that I have been doing this, they pay me the same for a calf, the females do not exceed 600 euros and the males, 700; the price of meat has not evolved at the same rate as that of other foods, ”he underlines with regret. The same complaint that he expressed yesterday, in these pages, Pili Tomàs, the protagonist of the sixth chapter of the Vida en los Pyrenees series, which ends today. Without subsidies, these farms would be unviable.
Like Pili, Joan also deplores that the cost of fodder has gone through the roof, a ton of alfalfa costs around 375 euros, almost double that of 2022. “Then there are the problems caused by roe deer and wild boar, the The first ones eat and crush the grasses and the second ones dig holes and destroy everything. The bear, so far, I have not seen. It is us, the cowboys, who are gardeners of the landscape, if they do not treat us better this will end ”, he predicts.
While he walks through the meadows and makes sure that the flock is well, he explains to his assistant how things should be done; he has been training him for a long time to be able to take a few days off and disconnect. He tells that the cows calve once a year after nine months or so of gestation, that they normally give birth to one calf, but that depending on the diet, some more may come into the world. He adds that these ruminants live on average about thirteen years, although there are some of his ruminants who have reached 19, and that the calf is with the mother until six or seven months, then it goes on fattening until 14, the age at which that is sacrificed A kind of small lesson for urbanites or newbies in this field. This is beautiful, it seems like paradise, but it is not. It has its B side.
Going out to the mountains or feeding the cattle in winter, when the cows rest in meadows near the town or in the stable, is a rewarding job, what costs more is staying at home to update the paperwork and formalize all the required documentation to justify grants. “We have the annual declaration of nitrogen, that is to say, that of cattle droppings; then the inspections of the CCPAE (Consell Català de la Producció Agrària Ecològica) to verify that we do not throw chemical fertilizers in the meadows, that the feed we give to the animals in winter is organic, that they have access to the pastures all year round, that they do not we give them medicines as preventive treatment…, and much, much more”.
Joan does not hide that he is having a good time, but it hurts him that all the effort involved in raising an animal on small open-air farms, as he and the farmers in the area, from Astell and the neighboring towns of Obeix and Aguiró, do, is not well paid. This leads him to think that the future is very uncertain, that only those who already have all the infrastructure set up by family tradition can afford to take care of the cattle. Starting from scratch now, he says, is impossible and some who have tried have had to close or find other complementary income. “These lands are cared for with the animals that graze and mowing the fields,” claims the protagonist of the chapter that closes this series.
