Amélie Poinssot

Je signe mon premier reportage pour Mediapart en janvier 2011. J’avais alors suivi des exilé·es arrivant à la frontière terrestre entre la Turquie et la Grèce. A l’époque, j’étais correspondante à Athènes pour différents médias français et francophones, travail que j’ai exercé également en Pologne les années précédentes (RFI, La Croix, AFP TV, Le Soir...).

Je rejoins la rédaction de Mediapart en février 2014. Je pars aussitôt pour la Crimée où j’assiste, en direct, à l’annexion de la péninsule ukrainienne par l’armée russe que je couvre pour le journal.

Pendant les années qui suivent, je traite, depuis Paris ou sur le terrain, de l’actualité européenne : de la guerre en Ukraine à la poursuite de la crise grecque, en passant par la crise de l’accueil des exilé·es d’Irak et de Syrie, mais aussi la montée des nationalismes en Europe centrale, les politiques économiques et les débats sur les alternatives possibles en Europe.

Aujourd’hui je travaille au pôle écologie de la rédaction avec Mickaël Correia, Lucie Delaporte, et Jade Lindgaard. J’enquête sur les thématiques liées à l'agriculture et à la production alimentaire : agrobusiness, lobbies, impacts sur la santé et le vivant.

Je suis également membre du "comité écologie" de Mediapart, qui vise à réduire l’empreinte de notre activité sur les écosystèmes.

J'ai écrit deux livres publiés chez Actes Sud : Dans la tête de Viktor Orbán (2019, traduit en polonais et en hongrois), et Qui va nous nourrir ? Au cœur de l'urgence écologique, le renouveau paysan (2024). Je suis également co-autrice de Regards sur la « crise » grecque, publié sous la direction de Joëlle Dallègre chez L'Harmattan (2013).

@AmeliePoinssot@piaille.fr / @ameliepoinssot.bsky.social

Declaration of interest

In the interest of transparency towards its readers, Mediapart’s journalists fill out and make public since 2018 a declaration of interests on the model of the one filled out by members of parliament and senior civil servants with the High Authority for Transparency and Public Life (HATVP), a body created in 2014 after Mediapart’s revelations on the Cahuzac affair.

Consult my declaration of interests

All his articles

  • French study reveals high pesticide exposure for vineyard neighbours

    France — Report

    A study published this week by two French health agencies details a well-above-average exposure to pesticides of residents who live close to vineyards, as illustrated in urine and hair samples, and others of ambient and household air, dust and home-grown vegetables. The study was originally prompted by an unusual cluster of child cancer cases discovered in a wine-growing area of south-west France, one of which concerned Lucas Rapin (pictured) when he was aged five, and who now lives with the debilitating side effects of his successful treatment for leukaemia. Amélie Poinssot reports on the findings of the study, and hears from Rapin and his mother about their arduous experience.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • Paris court finds French state at fault for use of carcinogenic insecticide on Caribbean islands

    Écologie

    In a landmark ruling, the Paris administrative court of appeal this week found that the French state must pay damages to victims of the carcinogenic insecticide chlordecone, which it allowed to be used on banana plantations on France’s Caribbean islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe for three years after it was banned on the mainland. The court has also widened the criteria of eligibility for the compensation. Amélie Poinssot reports.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • The poetic novel that evokes France's damaged but still enduring rural world

    Culture et idées

    Novelist Juliette Rousseau's latest work 'Péquenaude' is a book that is hard to categorise. It is a poetic and political narrative, rooted in a countryside that has been disfigured by agribusiness. As Amélie Poinssot notes, the author - who has returned to her native Brittany in western France after many years living in Paris – has written a work based around a rural world that is loved and damaged in equal measure.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • The pesticides banned in France but sold as exports since

    France

    Chemicals used in pesticides that are banned in France, some of them outlawed 20 years ago, have continued to be produced in the country and are sold abroad where environmental and public health legislation is less strict, according to a joint investigation by French public broadcaster France Télévisions and Swiss NGO Public Eye. The practice is perfectly legal thanks to a loophole in legislation which is still in place despite a government pledge two years ago to remove it. Amélie Poinssot reports.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • The haunting relics of a lost 'Jerusalem'

    International

    Paris-based photographer Martin Barzilai went in search of the history of his father’s family, who until the outbreak of World War II all lived in the Greek port city of Thessaloniki, once known as “the Jerusalem of the Balkans” for its centuries-old Jewish population. His quest took him to Greece and the story of how that population, including members of his family, was wiped out during the German occupation of Thessaloniki, when even the tombstones from the Jewish cemetery, razed in 1942, were used as building material, still visible on the city’s streets today. His investigations are now told in words and photos in a book, 'Cimetière fantôme : Thessalonique', with contributions from two historians, and reviewed here by Amélie Poinssot.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • Alarm over creeping ‘financialization’ and fragmentation of French farmland

    France

    Access to ownership or rental of agricultural land for French farmers setting up an activity is proving increasingly difficult, in part because of the rising prices fuelled by private and agribusiness investors in mega-farms, and also because of the increasing fragmentation of smallholdings, according to two reports published this week. Both call for the swift introduction of measures to reverse a trend that threatens a profound change in French agriculture. Amélie Poinssot reports.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • EU court forces France to end use of ‘bee killer’ insecticide

    Europe

    French agriculture minister Marc Fesneau has announced the end of a controversial exemption granted to sugar beet producers to use a family of insecticides dubbed “bee killers” and which were banned by the European Union in 2018. The move follows a ruling last week by the European Court of Justice, the EU’s supreme court, which outlaws member states from any further use of a legal loophole which allowed for "emergency" dispensation from the ban on neonicotinoids, which scientific studies have linked to a collapse of colonies of honey bees and other pollinators, and also bird populations. Amélie Poinssot reports.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • Seeking answers to a summer of extremes

    France — Interview

    France is grappling with the consequences of a series of successive heatwaves this summer, aggravated by record drought conditions which began in winter, leading to massive wildfires, a fall in energy production, and tumbling crop yields. While weather predictions suggest this autumn will see notably violent storms, these are expected to have little effect on the refilling of phreatic zones. Mediapart turned to French hydrologist Emma Haziza to explore what must change to ensure the future supply and protection of water.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • 'Bloodlands' author Timothy Snyder on why Russia’s war against Ukraine is 'genocide'

    International — Interview

    In this interview with Mediapart, Yale University professor of history Timothy Snyder, a specialist on eastern European history and notably Ukraine, author of Bloodlands, his internationally acclaimed book about mass murders in central and eastern Europe beginning in the 1930s, argues why he believes Russia’s war against Ukraine amounts to genocide in the full legal sense of the term. He also sketches Ukraine’s long history of resistance to oppression, the singular character of its society, and why it is vital for the future Europe, and even Russia, that Ukraine wins the war.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • European Commission VP Timmermans says Ukraine war has ‘increased urgency’ for a ‘sustainable society’

    International — Interview

    The upheaval of Russia’s war against Ukraine has further tested the already challenging agenda for the introduction of the European Commission’s measures on climate change, and notably its ambitious ‘Green Deal’ programme aimed at making the EU carbon neutral by 2050. The man in the hot seat is Frans Timmermans, European Commission vice-president responsible for the Green Deal and climate change measures. In this interview with Mediapart, he discusses the impact on the bloc of the war in Ukraine, the fossil fuel quandary, why European agriculture must move away from intensive farming to a sustainable, environmentalist model, and why he calls upon political leaders to show the “courage to recognise the crisis that we are in”.

    by Mickaël Correia and Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • The emerging voting patterns of rural France

    France — Interview

    The first round of voting earlier this month in France’s presidential elections showed notable political differences between the country’s regions, and also between rural areas and large urban centres. As next Sunday’s decisive second round of the elections approaches, Mediapart’s Amélie Poinssot turned to sociologist Benoît Coquard, a specialist researcher of rural communities, for his insight into the voting patterns that have emerged.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

  • Intensive farming: the behind-the-scenes story of a French poultry giant’s vast expansion plan

    France — Investigation

    After it was taken over by Dutch group Plukon in 2017, French poultry giant Duc began a massive development of its industrial production of chickens. This involved halting its production of organic and certified chickens, a major extension of its slaughterhouse at its HQ in northern Burgundy, and the future construction of 80 giant broiler houses in the neighbouring countryside. The expansion, which mirrors industrial poultry production practices elsewhere in France and Europe, has raised concerns locally over its environmental impact, and in a number of villages opponents speak of a climate of intimidation. Amélie Poinssot reports.

    by Amélie Poinssot

    Free access

All his blog posts

Mediapart’s journalists also use their blogs, and participate in their own name to this space of debates, by confiding behind the scenes of investigations or reports, doubts or personal reactions to the news.

Amélie Poinssot (avatar)

Amélie Poinssot

Mediapart Journalist

12 Posts

0 Editions

  • Au Salon de l'Agriculture, la FNSEA prise pour cible par Extinction Rébellion

    Blog post

    Le salon de l'Agriculture, inauguré samedi 26 février par Emmanuel Macron, a été fortement perturbé ce dimanche. Pendant quelques heures, le stand de la FNSEA a été occupé par le collectif Extinction Rébellion qui dénonce « les ravages de l'agriculture intensive que le syndicat défend avec acharnement ».

  • Violences et intimidations policières: en Hongrie aussi

    Blog post

    Depuis le 12 décembre, les manifestations se succèdent à Budapest et dans plusieurs villes hongroises. De façon inédite depuis qu'Orbán est au pouvoir, cette résistance fait face à l'usage de la force côté police. Des dizaines de manifestants pacifiques ont été placés en garde à vue et certains sont poursuivis pour violences en réunion.

  • Les œuvres d'exilés en Europe, au théâtre d'Aubervilliers

    Blog post

    A Aubervilliers, le théâtre de la Commune accueille, du 23 au 25 mars, une exposition atypique : les réalisations artistiques de réfugiés ayant traversé l'Europe en 2015. Les visiteurs pourront rencontrer certains d'entre eux à l'occasion d'une table ronde, samedi à 14 heures.

  • Soutien au journaliste polonais Tomasz Piątek

    Blog post

    La liberté de la presse est de plus en plus attaquée en Pologne. Tomasz Piątek est poursuivi depuis des mois par le pouvoir pour un livre d'enquête sur le ministre polonais de la Défense. Rencontre avec celui qui s'est vu remettre le prix « journaliste » 2017 de Reporters sans frontières.

  • Réfugiés: quand des lecteurs de Mediapart se mobilisent

    Blog post

    A Narbonne, un collectif s'est monté pour venir en aide aux réfugiés en Grèce. A Nîmes, « SoliGrecs » s'active depuis un an et demi pour soutenir les dispensaires grecs autogérés. A Paris, ils sont nombreux, aussi, à se mobiliser depuis des années... Tout ce beau monde converge en ce moment autour d'une « Caravane Solidaire » qui s'apprête à traverser la France. Rencontre avec des gens de terrain qui, plutôt que de se morfondre devant la passivité de nos politiques, ont décidé de prendre les choses en mains.