The idea then, proposed by Benjamin Raspail, a deputy, was to create a "national festival", as part of a republican package that also included adopting "la Marseillaise" as the French national anthem.
Others, however, have adopted the philosophy that it is best to use the water while it is still economically profitable to do so and to concentrate on high-value crops such as cotton.
In contrast, the approach that is generally adopted these days is characterized by a substantial lack of formality when rendering the product specifications.