Agricultural entrepreneurship as a means for migrants integration in rural spaces. The case of Morrocans in the Comtat (France)

International audienceMost researchers have enlightened entrepreneurship among migrants from an underground economy perspective. Transmigrants business owners practices are relying on their abilities to set up circulatory territories. But they were mostly analyzed in urban contexts. In developed countries, rural spaces invested by migrants from the southern hemisphere is often studied through the prism of their vulnerability.I suggest to consider migrants as entrepreneurs to question how their economic activity shapes rural spaces. I focus on migrants agricultural productivity, based on self-employment. My case study is a mediterranean suburban countryside, the Comtat, where numerous seasonal farm workers come every year, mostly Morrocans. For several years, it has appeared that the status of farm workers has been replaced by agricultural entrepreneurship. How self-employed Morrocans agricultural activity contributes to their social integration in rural spaces ? This proposition relies on the materials collected through participant observation for my PHD thesis in Geography. Farming entrepreneurship is firstly a source of income for migrants who are looking for economic achievement. Being self-employed is a way for Moroccan migrants to exit the status of farm worker. Despite their low income, they conceive their situation as a form of social ascent. They are considered as unavoidable actors in the Mediterranean agriculture.Moreover their local integration goes along with a shift from informal to formal agricultural practices. Thereby, the Mediterranean model is an ideal of accomplishment for Moroccan farmers.Hence, we propose to discuss the paradox between migrants’ mobility and how they manage to settle through the entrepreneurship experience