The demonstrations have become increasingly vigorous, with traffic barricades, dumps of foul-smelling agricultural waste outside government offices and other protests. Farmers have also been turning road signs upside down in protest at what they argue are nonsensical agricultural policies.

France is one of Europe’s agricultural powerhouses, with influential farming lobbies but also deep discontent among farmers, who say they struggle to make ends meet despite working long hours to feed the country and boost its exports with their produce.

French President Emmanuel Macron’s government has been working to assuage farmers’ concerns before their anger blows up into a wider movement, like the yellow vest protests against economic injustice in 2019 that dented Macron’s popularity and saw frequent violence between protesters and riot police.

Attal, the prime minister newly installed by Macron in a government reshuffle this month, posted on social media that “being a farmer means working without respite. It’s working for us, for the French. We are and will remain at their side”.

Commenting on the accident he said the woman killed in the Ariège region of south-western France was a farmer. French media reported that she raised cows.

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“All our farmers are in mourning. Our nation is shocked,” Attal said adding he would meet farmers’ representative bodies in coming days.

In a social media post, Macron described the accident as a tragedy that “upsets us all”, and said he had ordered his government to find “concrete solutions” to the difficulties that farmers are highlighting.

The death and injuries provoked an outpouring of emotion in parliament, with MPs standing solemnly to applaud the victims and the profession more generally.

“We can say today that we are all farmers,” said Dominique Potier, a socialist.

The car that rammed into the barricade of straw bales in the town of Pamiers was carrying three people, the prosecutor said in his statement.

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The woman killed in the pre-dawn collision was in her 30s, the statement said. Her husband was seriously injured and hospitalised, and their teenage daughter was helicoptered to hospital in a critical condition, the prosecutor said. She later died, Reuters and French media reported.

His statement said the collision did not appear to be intentional. Police detained the three occupants of the car for questioning.

Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau said the woman died “while defending her profession”. He cancelled his trip to an EU meeting in Brussels to travel to the site.

Farming policy has always been a sensitive issue in France, the EU’s biggest agricultural producer, where thousands of independent producers of meat, dairy, wine and other produce have a record of staging disruptive protests.

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Macron is wary of farmers’ growing support for the far right ahead of the EU parliament elections in June, with Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National party leading in the polls.

“We must not give in to demagogy and simple answers. Demagogy and simplicity are the worst things to do, especially when there is a crisis like this one,” Fesneau told MPs.

The farming lobby says the outrage is mainly fuelled by the government’s recent efforts – spearheaded by Finance and Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire – to fight inflation, urging retailers and food giants to cut prices.

“Prices are the number one priority”, said Patrick Benezit, the head of the FNB cattle farmer union. Added pressure on suppliers was being passed on to farmers, forcing some to sell below real costs, which would go against a law aimed at guaranteeing fair prices.

AP, Reuters