2026, the year France broke its records

Marie D'Ovidio

Mieux Donner · Reading time: 18 min

French maize yielded 6.30 tonnes per hectare this year. Wheat yielded 6.92. Maize finished more than half a tonne below wheat[1]Agreste, crop report of 13 October 2026, reported by Terre-net.

Outside farming the sentence means nothing. To an arable farmer it is startling. Maize out-yields wheat structurally and by a wide margin, which is the whole reason for growing it, thirsty as it is. The gap inverted in a single season.

The sentence sums up what France has been through. Markers that looked stable have all moved the same way, and the sequence has not closed: on 1 October, 66 per cent of groundwater monitoring points sat below their seasonal normal and 81 per cent were still falling[2]BRGM, groundwater bulletin for 1 October 2026.

This article takes stock of the year. It ends on a practical question: when water and grain run short, someone has to decide who gets them. Who decides, and on what grounds? Answering that kind of question with numbers is what Mieux Donner does, and we do it in the final section.

What the heat cost in lives

Let us start there, because it matters most.

Santé publique France publishes no total. It publishes one bulletin per heat episode, and each figure comes with the word minimum attached. Added together, the summer's four episodes give at least 7,900 excess deaths between late May and 20 August[3]Santé publique France, national bulletin Canicule et santé, 16 September 2026, and the bulletins for earlier episodes.

The last episode fell almost entirely on people aged 75 and over, who account for 751 of those excess deaths[3]Santé publique France, national bulletin Canicule et santé, 16 September 2026, and the bulletins for earlier episodes. During the July episode, mortality ran 9.2 per cent above expectation across every mainland region except Corsica, and peaked in the Pays de la Loire at 21.4 per cent[4]Santé publique France, mortality surveillance bulletin, heatwave of 3 to 22 July 2026.

Two cautions apply to these numbers. They rest on death certificates from a sample of 5,000 communes, scaled up to the country and compared with the average of the previous six years. They record the gap from expectation, not the cause of death. They are also provisional: INSEE will publish consolidated data in early 2027, and only then can the link with heat be established. Some press tallies put the figure at 8,124, counting the late-May episode on a broader basis[5]Maire-info, « Plus de 8 000 morts en excès durant l'été dernier, selon un bilan provisoire », 21 September 2026.

One figure places the summer without ambiguity. According to Santé publique France, the temperature anomaly for summer 2026 reached 3.6°C above the reference, ahead of 2003 at 2.7°C and 2022 at 2.3°C[3]Santé publique France, national bulletin Canicule et santé, 16 September 2026, and the bulletins for earlier episodes. For scale on mortality, the 2003 heatwave killed around 15,000 people.

The soil

In early August the soil moisture index fell below every value computed since the Météo-France series began, in August 1958. The index does not come from field measurements. A model estimates the soil water reserve at national scale[6]Météo-Paris, « Sécheresse : l'été 2026 rejoint déjà les pires années de l'histoire », 6 August 2026, using Météo-France data.

The comparison with 1976, the benchmark French drought, gives the scale. Between 15 May and 5 August, the mean temperature in 2026 reached 23.0°C, where 1976 recorded 19.6°C. That is close to three and a half degrees, sustained over almost three months[6]Météo-Paris, « Sécheresse : l'été 2026 rejoint déjà les pires années de l'histoire », 6 August 2026, using Météo-France data.

The rest of the continent followed the same slope. The Rhine dropped to a level that limited barges to 20 per cent of their load[7]MercoPress, « Rhine barges run at 20% of capacity », 3 August 2026. At Cremona the Po reached its lowest recorded level, 8.59 metres below the hydrometric zero[8]ANSA, « Il fiume Po a Cremona non è mai stato così basso », 31 July 2026. On the Danube, the Hungarian plant at Paks shut down two reactors and cut output to 25 per cent. Romania shut both reactors at Cernavodă in mid-August, its only nuclear plant, for want of cooling flow[9]Al Jazeera, « Falling Danube flow forces shutdown of Romania's sole nuclear plant », 13 August 2026.

The harvests

Agreste revised its estimate three times. In August it expected a grain maize crop of 9.0 million tonnes. In September, 8.1. In its report of 13 October the figure fell to 7.3 million tonnes, close to half the 13.9 million harvested in 2025[1]Agreste, crop report of 13 October 2026, reported by Terre-net.

Yield followed. At 6.30 tonnes per hectare the crop is down 27 per cent on the year, and you have to go back to 1990 and its 6.03 tonnes to find lower. Harvested area lost 455,000 hectares, of which roughly 150,000 went to forage because there were no cobs worth combining[1]Agreste, crop report of 13 October 2026, reported by Terre-net.

Grassland growth, which feeds the herds, stood at 52 per cent of its usual annual production by 20 July, where the 1989-2018 reference period gives 70 per cent at that date[11]Agreste, ISOP system (Agreste, Météo-France, INRAE), situation at 20 July 2026.

What it does to farm incomes, and why this is not one bad year

Arvalis, the technical institute for French arable growers, puts the pre-tax current income of cereal farms at minus 3,600 euros per unpaid worker for 2026. That makes four consecutive years in the red: minus 600 euros in 2023, minus 7,200 in 2024, minus 6,500 in 2025. Total arable losses come to 6.5 billion euros[12]Arvalis, figures presented by Éric Thirouin for the AGPB at a press conference on 8 September 2026, reported by Réussir.

The 2027 figure says more than the 2026 one. The Piloter sa Ferme model, built on an average 160-hectare farm, projects a deficit of 85 euros per hectare next year even if yields return to normal. The break-even price for wheat has risen from 168 euros a tonne in 2021 to 230 euros in 2027, driven by input and machinery costs that are up 43 and 45 per cent[13]Piloter sa Ferme, « Ferme France » model, figures published by Pleinchamp on 1 October 2026.

Britain sends the same signal in a different form. The 2026 cereal harvest, estimated at 18.5 million tonnes, is the smallest on record. According to the AHDB, four of the five worst harvests in the series will have fallen in this decade: 2020, 2024, 2025 and 2026[14]Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit, using AHDB data, 14 August 2026.

Vegetables, the least covered part

In Brittany the growers' organisation Cerafel, which sells under the Prince de Bretagne label, puts the loss at 22 per cent of annual potential in two months. On unirrigated plots, losses reach 90 to 100 per cent for artichokes, broccoli, lettuce and parsnips. Cauliflower is down 20 per cent, and peas came in at 40 per cent of expected volume[15]AOP Cerafel, Prince de Bretagne label, quoted by Réussir, 13 August 2026.

Attention has now turned to autumn and winter. Leeks, parsnips and Jerusalem artichokes are proving difficult to grow, and some plots may not be planted at all[16]ConsoGlobe, « Sécheresse 2026 : quels légumes pourraient manquer ? », 11 August 2026, quoting Légumes de France.

Ninety-four thousand people with no water from the tap

Brittany is the region people name when they talk about moving somewhere that stays cool and wet. Start there.

Finistère has been under drought crisis status since 7 August, with restrictions running to 15 November. In mid-September the prefecture noted that no significant rain had fallen since 10 June. Watering a garden, filling a pool and washing a car at home are all banned, and drinking water can no longer go to irrigation[17]Finistère prefectoral order, relayed by the City of Brest, page updated 17 September 2026. September's rain changed none of it. Lannion recorded 9 millimetres against a normal of 53, its driest September since 1994, while Nantes reached 34.2°C on the 6th[18]Météo Bretagne, September 2026 climate review, published 1 October.

Then the October rain came, and Brittany still ran close to breaking point. In mid-October the Drennec reservoir, which supplies part of Finistère, stood at 33 per cent full and could be all but empty by the end of November, which would put the supply of 310,000 people at risk. Saint-Malo Agglomération expects to cut supply to 160,000 people on 10 December if no rain falls before that date. The prefect of Finistère is weighing up whether to trigger the ORSEC emergency plan. According to the BRGM, 71 per cent of Brittany's groundwater sat at a low or very low level at the end of September, and 81 per cent in Finistère alone[19]AFP, « En plein automne, la Bretagne à deux doigts de la rupture en eau potable », 22 October 2026. Quotation translated from the French.

Stéphane Roudaut, the mayor of Brest, summed it up in a line that says what this article is trying to say: "We joke about the rainfall here all the time. Except this time it is not a joke."[19]AFP, « En plein automne, la Bretagne à deux doigts de la rupture en eau potable », 22 October 2026. Quotation translated from the French

Elsewhere the counter keeps climbing. At the end of July, around 30,000 people across 80 communes had lost their running water. By 12 August the figure was more than 40,000 across 97 communes[20]Presse-Papiers, after Le Nouvel Obs, situation at 12 August 2026. On 9 September the environment minister, Monique Barbut, counted 64,000[21]Statement by Monique Barbut, Minister for Ecological Transition, 9 September 2026. In the late-September count, 94,000 people were being supplied by tanker lorry or in bottles, for drinking, cooking and washing. And 6.4 million people now live in an area where the drinking water supply is under watch, 223,000 more than a month earlier[22]End of September 2026 official count, reported by AFP on 7 October.

Thirty thousand, forty thousand, sixty-four thousand, ninety-four thousand. This is not an incident. It is a curve.

The geography of those communes says something useful: the problem is not regional. Tanker deliveries are running in the Massif Central, the Jura, Aveyron, the Alpes-Maritimes, the Haut-Rhin and Brittany. Fleurey, 500 residents in the Jura. Saint-Martin-d'Estreaux, 1,000 residents in the Loire. Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines, 800 residents in the Haut-Rhin. The Laguiole and Aubrac area, 3,000 people. In the Carladez basin in Aveyron, more than half of the 3,000 residents depend on tankers[23]Tous pour l'eau, « Sécheresse persistante : des camions-citernes livrent de l'eau potable », 19 August 2026. One tanker carries up to 29,000 litres per trip, and the state covers part of the haulage cost.

Below ground, the recharge has not begun. On 1 October the BRGM recorded 81 per cent of groundwater levels still falling, 66 per cent below the monthly norm, and recharge under way at only 7 per cent of monitoring points. The worst hit aquifers lie in the Limousin, the Morvan, the Jura, the Vosges and the Alsace plain. The BRGM writes that this autumn's levels will necessarily sit below those of 2025[2]BRGM, groundwater bulletin for 1 October 2026.

The number of departments involved has gone on rising as well. On 10 September, 93 were under restriction, 74 of them at crisis level[24]Reporterre, « Sécheresse : 74 départements en crise, du jamais-vu en septembre », 15 September 2026. By early October, 79 were at crisis level, with a further 14 on heightened alert[25]VigiEau data, early October 2026, quoted by Meteored France on 10 October. At crisis level, irrigation is banned unless a derogation applies, and a derogation is often limited to the night hours.

The animals that died of heat

This is the part of the year that the press covered least.

According to Anvol, the poultry trade body, between 2.5 and 3 million meat birds died within a few days during the late June heat[26]Comptoir des éleveurs, « Canicule 2026 : le bilan pour l'agriculture française », quoting the Anvol trade body and the regional chamber of agriculture. Across the country, rendering services handled 9,127 tonnes of dead animals, more than two thirds of it poultry. Brittany accounts for roughly 6,600 tonnes on its own, and rendering capacity there was saturated[26]Comptoir des éleveurs, « Canicule 2026 : le bilan pour l'agriculture française », quoting the Anvol trade body and the regional chamber of agriculture. Nouvelle-Aquitaine applied for a derogation allowing exceptional burial, a procedure that had not been used since 2003[27]Reporterre, « Canicule : des centaines de milliers de volailles meurent dans les élevages intensifs », August 2026, quoting the Anvol trade body.

Laying hens are counted separately. Around 700,000 died over the summer, 440,000 of them in Brittany, which is 2 per cent of the region's 22 million layers. The effect reached the shelves straight away: national egg production dropped by a million eggs a day, according to the national egg board[28]ConsoGlobe, « 700 000 poules mortes : la canicule menace-t-elle vraiment nos œufs ? », 17 August 2026, quoting the CNPO.

Thierry Houeul, who chairs the farming union federation in Côtes-d'Armor, gives the order of magnitude that explains these figures: a poultry shed holds between 30,000 and 40,000 birds[27]Reporterre, « Canicule : des centaines de milliers de volailles meurent dans les élevages intensifs », August 2026, quoting the Anvol trade body. A building of that size cannot be cooled.

The 2003 precedent gives the scale of what happens when the heat lasts longer: six million birds dead, and mortality in dairy herds up 24 per cent on a normal year[27]Reporterre, « Canicule : des centaines de milliers de volailles meurent dans les élevages intensifs », August 2026, quoting the Anvol trade body.

What this will do to your shopping

That leaves the question everyone asks: how does one bad maize harvest move the price of far more products than maize?

Because maize is not mainly human food in France. It is animal feed.

World prices are moving the same way. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations publishes a monthly index that tracks the price of the main commodities on international markets. In September it stood 5.8 per cent higher over twelve months, and its cereals component 17.2 per cent higher[29]FAO Food Price Index, September 2026 reading, published 2 October. Those are the prices traders pay, not shelf prices: one usually takes three to six months to feed through to the other[30]IFDC, Fertilizer Crisis Response Bulletin no. 25, 18 August 2026. So this summer's rise should show up in the shops this winter.

For a French household, food eaten at home accounts for around 13 per cent of spending[31]INSEE, national accounts, household consumption 2025. A price rise forces a trade-off: less meat, more own-brand, some products dropped from the basket altogether.

And the October rain was not enough

One last chapter, because it changes how the rest should be read.

September was dry. By the 22nd, 84 per cent of France was in a one-in-ten-year drought, meaning a level seen on average once a decade. In Languedoc-Roussillon, the Dordogne, Corrèze and the Bas-Rhin, Météo-France recorded levels never observed before in any season[32]Météo-France, soil drought review at 22 September 2026. Six towns had not seen a drop of rain since late August: Ajaccio, Le Luc, Nice, Romorantin, Paris-Montsouris and Savigny-Véron[32]Météo-France, soil drought review at 22 September 2026.

Then the rain came back. Over the first 27 days of October, Solenzara in Corsica took 610 millimetres, more than six times its normal, Marignane 294 and Brest 153. Near the Channel and the North Sea the surplus runs between 30 and 60 per cent. You would think the matter was settled[33]Météo-Paris, provisional October 2026 climate review covering the first 27 days, published 28 October, using Météo-France data.

It is not. The centre-west and the south-west stayed dry, with Niort ending the month on 32 millimetres, 46 per cent below its normal. More to the point, soil moisture nationally remains within the driest 10 per cent of situations for the season, alongside a monthly temperature anomaly of plus 1.2°C[33]Météo-Paris, provisional October 2026 climate review covering the first 27 days, published 28 October, using Météo-France data.

On 27 October the Manche became the first department to lift all its restrictions, after ten days of rain gave the rivers workable flows. In the same announcement the prefecture made clear that groundwater had not recovered, that the Gast reservoir was still only 30 per cent full, and that it was not ruling out a return to restrictions[34]Prefecture of the Manche, order of 27 October 2026 lifting restrictions, reported in the local press.

What these numbers say, and what they do not

Any single year can be an anomaly. But soil moisture fell below every value recorded since 1958, the summer ran far ahead of the reference summers since 1900, and maize dropped to 6.30 tonnes per hectare. Three markers, one season, all pointing the same way.

The fourth owes nothing to one summer's weather: cereal farm income has been negative for the fourth year running.

What 2027 holds, we do not know. Retail prices have not finished moving, winter planting decisions are being taken now, and the consolidated mortality figures will not arrive before early next year. Anyone putting a number on next year today is making it up.

What can be said is that the cause of this year is no mystery. A warmer atmosphere dries soil faster, blocks pollination above a temperature threshold, and kills elderly people and housed animals alike. That cause decides whether the years ahead look like this one.

The question this year raises

Set side by side, the facts in this article describe an allocation. Irrigation is banned in 79 departments unless a derogation applies. Irrigated maize yielded two thirds more than unirrigated maize, but 58 per cent of the area has no access to water. Ninety-four thousand people are waiting for a tanker while a cow drinks up to 150 litres a day.

Nobody set out those terms. They are decided by prefectoral order, under pressure, on a network and a farming model built for a climate that no longer exists. The two to three million dead birds follow the same logic: no farmer chose to lose a flock, and no farmer designed sheds holding 40,000 animals with no cooling. That model was built when feed was cheap and summers were bearable. Both assumptions gave way in the same season.

Livestock farmers are taking this year harder than anyone, and nothing here is laid at their door. The question is about what gets funded from now on.

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