Threatened with disappearance a year ago, the watercress is reborn in Enquin-sur-Baillons in the Pas-de-Calais
A year ago, the mayor of Enquin-sur-Baillons in Pas-de-Calais called for one of the last watercress beds in his town not to remain abandoned. The call has been heard: an integration association is now in charge of the site. Last November, the first bunches of watercress were collected.
Pierre-André Leleu is a happy man. The mayor of Enquin-sur-Baillons, a small town in the Vallée de la Course near Hucqueliers in Pas-de-Calais, succeeded in saving one of the last watercress groves in the village from abandonment, after a call launched in the media a year ago.
Today, the watercress plant is once again producing its small green leaves. And it’s organic! It is the Cré’Actif integration association based in Saint-Martin-Boulogne, already involved in organic market gardening, which was chosen from among 25 candidates to manage the site. It benefits from a two-year reduction of 40% on the rental of the land.
“We already have on our side a few hectares of market gardening and there, we come to a new territory and a new culture, explains Loïc Cheuva, director of the association. Watercress is a winter crop that balances our activity throughout the year. When the other fields empty in November, it helps to re-mobilize our employees on other crops. “
To restore this local heritage: 5000 m2 of organic watercress, we had to learn everything from A to Z with former cress growers: redo flint stone basins so that the spring water of Baillons constantly bathes the cultivation, finding and planting the seeds. Thus, since the end of November, the association’s back-to-work employees have been harvesting the famous green plant twice a week. Scissors in the hand, feet and hands in the water, they cut the watercress.
“We pick with the root, we only keep the leaves with the stems and we leave the part with the roots in the water and it will resume … After three to four weeks, new clumps will emerge”, indicates Mickaël Caton, trainer at the association.
10,000 bunches of watercress should be produced for this first harvest, but the association expects 20,000 to 40,000 bunches for years to come. The production is sold in short circuit in local shops.
The association also transforms it into soup in its workshops in Saint-Martin-Boulogne. Each week, a hundred-year-old liter is produced on site and distributed in organic stores.
Proud of his rediscovered local heritage, the mayor of Enquin-sur-Baillons is now the sales representative of the watercress in his town. He has many contacts with regional restaurateurs so that they promote the product in their menus.
He even hopes to launch the first watercress festival in Enquin-sur-Baillons next spring.