The Discussion on Industrial Restructuring

There are three phases in the debate on industrial transition.The first stage was the restructuring policies of the 1980s,nationalisations and the advent of the Minitel or the predecessor of the Internet. In 1986,the ambitious privatisation policy of the government of Edouard Baladur was a turning point because some few years later.The idea of a deregulation of the economy became very popular, to the extent that the privatisation of the national telecom operator or France Telecom in 1997(now Orange) was a huge success.

Signs of Industrial Decline

However,for the past three decades,tourism,aviation,luxury,infrastructure and agriculture were some of the sectors that observers will retain as the key industrial sectors.At the same time,the fact that in the 197Os there were 5 million people employed in the industrial sector,as against 3.1 million in 2018 describes our idea of industrial decline.Again,the debate on industrial restructuring was high under president Mitterrand and in 1997, the closure of the assembly plant of Renault at Vilvoode,during the tenure of Louis Schweitzer generated public outcry.Arcellor Mittal,under president François Hollande was a subject of verbal spats between government officials and trade union leaders and the restructuring of General Electric,Bosch and Ascoval industrial sites were the headaches of the government.According to the findings of Trendeo,the consulting firm,only 6% of the 1 723 industrial sites that closed in the past few years re-opened and this report confirmed the notion of industrial decline that is responsible for the strategy of industrial transition.

Signs of Industrial Transition

TEven with this evolution many observers consider globalisation as the main source of industrial decline and neglect the cost of production factor in their analysis.A situation that made the National Council on Industry(conseil national de l'industrie) to propose in a policy paper titled Our ambition for industry, the creation of 124 industrial territories and 17 measures to revitalise the industrial sector.Industrial labs were introduced with the objectives of making industrial innovation a reality.While the series of tests on driveless car constitute another  notable element of industrial re-structuring.

Covid-19 Crisis Exposed Flaws in Industrial Production

Again the agreement signed in May 2019 between France and Germany to create factories for the production of electric car batteries with effect from October 2019 was an indicator of industrial transition efforts.And last year,the Covid-19 crisis exposed the flaws in the production of important drugs and the recent economic plan(plan de relance)released in October 2021,contained projects covering the production of drugs against cancers, proposals for the automobile sector, to make the annual Buy Made In France products campaign another aspect of industrial restructuring. 

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