science

Order of Agricultural Merit

Order of Agricultural Merit is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Order of Agricultural Merit rather than just read about it. In short: The Order of Agricultural Merit (French: Ordre du Mérite agricole) is an order of merit bestowed by the French Republic for outstanding contributions to agriculture. When it was created in 1883, it was second in importance only to the Legion of Honour within the French order of precedence.

Key takeaways

Order of Agricultural Merit belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Order of Agricultural Merit to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Order of Agricultural Merit from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Order of Agricultural Merit (French: Ordre du Mérite agricole) is an order of merit bestowed by the French Republic for outstanding contributions to agriculture. When it was created in 1883, it was second in importance only to the Legion of Honour within the French order of precedence.

History The order was established on 7 July 1883, based on the proposition of the then Minister of Agriculture Jules Méline, in an effort to adequately reward services to agriculture in view of the maximum number of the Legion of Honour that could be awarded yearly. His reasoning was that more than eighteen million Frenchmen lived directly from this industry, which had a direct and powerful impact on the entire national economy (farmers, agronomists, professors, researchers, etc.). Labour was intensive and never ending, devotion was commonplace but the rewards were rare. The original 1883 decree created a single-grade order; only "Knights" (French: "chevaliers") were thus decorated. The decree of 18 June 1887 added the grade of "Officer" (French: "Officier"). A third grade, that of "Commander" (French: "Commandeur"), was created by a decree of 3 August 1900. The present form and statute of the Order of Agricultural Merit were outlined in decree 59-729 of 15 June 1959. To date, the Order has approximately 340,000 recipients, with about 23,000 alive at any given time, including all living former ministers of agriculture. Approximately 60,000 officers have been appointed to date, with about 5,000 currently living. Approximately 4,800 have been made commanders, with about 400 living at any given time.

Award statute The Order of Agricultural Merit rewards people who rendered exceptional services to agriculture, whether in public duties or in the very practice of agriculture. It also rewards people who distinguished themselves in scientific research or in related publications. There are two annual investiture ceremonies, the first on 1 January and the second on 14 July. The annual contingent has been limited to 60 commanders, 600 officers and 2,400 knights. Award prerequisites are as follows:

Knight: be at least thirty years of age with fifteen years of service/work; Officer: at least five years as a Member of the order; Commander: at least five years as an Officer of the order. Conditions of age and of seniority may be lowered for candidates who have outstanding qualifications. A 5% contingency is allowed for people gaining direct entry into the order as officers or commanders for exceptional reasons. Foreigners receiving the order are not subject to the seniority clause. Members of the Order of the Legion of Honour may be admitted to the Order of Agricultural Merit at the same rank they hold in the first. An award certificate always accompanies the order.

Insignia The Order of Agricultural Merit is in the form of a 40mm (35mm for pre November 1999) wide star, 60mm for the commander's insignia, with six white enamelled arms, the arms resting on a gilt wreath of wheat on the right and of corn on the left. On the obverse at its center, a gilt medallion bearing the effigy of the republic in the form of the relief right profile of a woman's head, the medallion is surrounded by a narrow blue enamelled band bearing the golden semi circular inscription "RÉPUBLIQUE FRANÇAISE" ("FRENCH REPUBLIC"). On the reverse, the gilt medallion bears the relief inscription on three lines "MÉRITE" "AGRICOLE" "1883" ("AGRICULTURAL MERIT 1883"), it is surrounded by a plain blue enamelled band. The officers' and commanders' badges also bear a gilt wreath, half vine and half olive branch, between the insignia and the ribbon suspension ring. The knight's insignia is made of silver, the officer's is made of silver-gilt, the commander's is made of silver-gilt or gold. The order hangs from a 37mm wide silk moiré green ribbon with 5mm amaranth vertical stripes located 1mm from the edges. The commander's insignia is worn on a cravat around the neck.

Notable recipients

Commanders Queen Anne, Queen Consort of Romania Gerrit Braks Albert II, Prince of Monaco Princess Caroline, Princess of Hanover King Charles III of the United Kingdom Jean Dupuy Jules Gravereaux Jean-Paul Huchon Christine Lagarde Stéphane Le Foll René Renou W. E. Shewell-Cooper Henri Stehlé Marc Darbonne

Officers Gerard Bertholon Christian Bind Michel Durodie Dominique Levy Ernest Vaux Luu Meng Pierre Galet John C. H. Lee Will Studd Oz Clarke

Knights Philippe Adnot Yann Arthus-Bertrand Florian Bellanger Wina Born Laura Calder Jacques Cariou Priyam Chatterjee Jean-Pierre Chessé Jacques Chirac Elizabeth David Vasily Dokuchaev Serge Dumont Alice Feiring Patricia Gallagher Thomas Harvey Gill Henry S. Graves Michel Guérard Hermann Jaeger Rita Jammet Mariel Jean-Brunhes Delamarre Paul Jules Jourcin Richard Juhlin Eugène Leguen de Lacroix Patrick Levaye Bernard Loiseau Kermit Lynch Debra Meiburg Christian André Monchatre Brian Morrissey Thomas Volney Munson Roland Passot Louis Pasteur Jacques Pépin Paul Prudhomme Thierry Rautureau Jean Rochefort Daniel Rose Wolfram Siebeck Lyle F. Watts Jean Wiener Jon Winroth Papa Abdoulaye Seck Estelle Touzet Shahrzad Shokouhivand Chee Song KOH Suswono

Unknown rank Jean Carmet Catherine Deneuve Paul Morand Roger Peyrefitte Charles Semblat Michel Serrault Thomas Jefferson

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Order of Agricultural Merit

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Order of Agricultural Merit claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Order of Agricultural Merit before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Order of Agricultural Merit ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Order of Agricultural Merit

In research: Order of Agricultural Merit appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Order of Agricultural Merit in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Order of Agricultural Merit is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1883 establishments in France, Agriculture in France, Awards established in 1883, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Order of Agricultural Merit outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Order of Agricultural Merit in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Order of Agricultural Merit means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Order of Agricultural Merit out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Order of Agricultural Merit in simple terms?

Why does Order of Agricultural Merit matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Order of Agricultural Merit?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Order of Agricultural Merit.