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Sarkozy kicks off France's largest agricultural fair

French President Nicolas Sarkozy inaugurated the 49th annual Salon de l’Agriculture in Paris on Saturday morning. This year’s fair is heavily politicised, with the presidential elections just two months away and candidates scrambling for the farming vote.

Reuters/Jacky Naegelen
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Candidates from various political bents will make appearances at the fair, including visits from MoDem’s François Bayrou on Sunday and socialist François Hollande on Tuesday.

Far-right party candidate Marine Le Pen, Jean-Luc Mélenchon (Left Party) and Eva Joly (Green Party) will all visit the fair before it wraps up on 4 March.

“The largest farm in France,” is expected to welcome 650,000 visitors this year, with stands serving food and beverage from the many farms around the country, plus the chance to admire cows, pigs and other livestock.

Besides its innate ability to entertain, the fair has traditionally been a key step in presidential campaigning and a strategy for obtaining the country’s farming vote.

Recent studies show that rural voters traditionally vote for right-wing parties, such as President Sarkozy’s current UMP group. However, Sarkozy has had to battle his way back onto good terms with rural voters, after the 2008 fair where he notoriously told a visitor to “get lost, poor jerk.”

Missing from this year’s fair will be former president Jacques Chirac – only his second absence in forty years.

 

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