Les structures spatiales de la collecte céréalière dans la région Centre

The « Centre » Programme Region is the main grain-producing region in France both as regards the area it covers and as regards the volume and range of its production. In addition to the traditional grain centres (Beauce, and the Berry part of Champagne) grain production has spread towards regions originally specializing in mixed farming. The collecting structures were analysed from the data provided by the ONIC and by the General Agricultural Census. A simple cartographic method was used which has the advantage, by schematizing, of bringing out the main features of the spatial collecting structures. This survey shows up : the preponderant role of the cooperative sector, the insignificance of utilizers as collectors (except for the malt-houses) and the survival of the middle-men, either in the traditional grain centres for the biggest of them or in the marginal centres for the smallest. In space the activities of these bodies overlap and give grain-collecting a complexity that is all the greater where grain production is highest. The results of the past five years reflects a generally slow evolution which, when it exists, takes place at the expense of private grain merchants to the advantage of cooperatives. The first examples of grain-collectors representing multinational, often foreign, firms that so far are of no significance, may well in the future bring about a restructuring of the collecting areas still characterized in the main by their anarchical nature.