Portrait de John McWilliam… Part two en français

Du cacao aux pommes

John McWilliam, un scientifique anglais, est propriétaire de L’Aunay Cidre, une petite exploitation à Sainte-Marguerite-de-Carrouges (Orne), acquise en 1987. Cet homme discret, féru d’arbres fruitiers, ne s’est fixé dans sa ferme normande qu’en 2002, après de nombreux voyages humanitaires.

« Quand je suis arrivé, j’ai dû parler français car personne ne me parlait en anglais » se rappelle John Mc William en souriant. A l’âge de 17 ans, il a découvert la Normandie en tant que bûcheron. Lors de sa première venue, en 1973, il a rencontré celui qui allait devenir son « plus vieil ami » avec qui il vient de fêter Noël. Sa ferme, étendue sur treize hectares, est perdue à Sainte-Marguerite-de-Carrouges, dans l’Orne. Né à Singapour en 1954, John Mc William y vit entouré de ses pommiers avec sa femme Lynn et ses trois enfants, tous nés en France : Justine, Patrick et Jeanne.

De 1975 à 2002, il a travaillé comme scientifique et humanitaire dans plusieurs pays : Ghana, Sierra Leone, Thaïlande, Malaisie, Papouasie-Nouvelle-Guinée… C’est dans ce dernier qu’il a rencontré Lynn, sa future femme. Originaire de Vancouver, elle était alors volontaire pour le CUSO (Canadian University Service Overseas). Lui s’occupait de plantations de cacao pour le gouvernement britannique.

Tous deux, avec leurs enfants, ont participé à plusieurs missions en Asie et en Afrique dans le but d’aider « les personnes à gagner de l’argent par elles mêmes ». De petites tables en formes d’éléphants et des armoires typiques dans le salon trahissent leur passé sur le continent africain. Elles ont été faites sur mesure au Ghana, où la famille a vécu pendant sept ans.

Portrait de John McWilliam… Part one in english

A life spent overseas to help people

John Mc William has a little cider mill in Sainte-Marguerite-de-Carrouges, in Normandy. From 1975 to 2002, he worked in several countries in Asia and Africa. First as a scientist, then to help people make their own money.

His dream was to become “a scientist, an inventor or an explorer.” John McWilliam, 57 years old, is a British scientist born in Singapore who married his Canadian wife in Thailand, fell in love with Ghana and is now the head of a little cider mill in Normandy.

He came to France for the first time in 1973 to work as a lumberjack near Alençon. “I wanted to do something manual and physical” he explains. After that, from 1975 to 2002, he worked overseas for the British or the German government. At the beginning, with a scholarship given by the British government, he worked as a scientist specialized on acid soils for three years. “The first time I worked in Thailand was in an area with very acidic soils. They had to control it extremely carefully using water control measures.”

But he wanted to act more. He decided to work for the Commonwealth Development Corporation: “ A very little known but extremely powerful organization which deals with development, energy, agriculture…” For him, it had been the beginning of another life and the end of research “much more limiting.” He says: “Research can give an answer to a lot of questions but without the political will and power to put this in operation, nothing will happen.”

John Mc William worked in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Papua and New Guinea, Ghana and Sierra Leone to help the local inhabitants develop their own small plantations and to be able to grow and develop their own cocoa crops. In Ghana, he spent seven years in the Volta region in forestry reserves to try to stop illegal timber cutting. He also tried to stabilize the fertility of the soils. “The main emphasize for me has been to help people to be able to make money” he said with a broad smile. But from Ghana, news from his friends doesn’t sound very good: “I don’t say it is all lost, people have learned things, but the stability of the system is under threat.”