The budget of the Ministry of the Armed Forces, the state's first investment budget, has a "major role to play" in supporting the French defense industry, of which many companies have been weakened by the crisis, Minister Florence said on Sunday Parly.
"We have a major role to play in meeting the needs of our forces and in supporting the entire defense industrial and technological base, its large groups and its thousands of SMEs and SMIs, and preventing them from being impacted by the coronavirus crisis , ”she said in an interview with Ouest-France .
Read also: Defense: budgets have returned to their 2009 level
The defense industry in France represents nearly 200,000 jobs, most of them highly qualified, and a surplus for foreign trade. Many companies in the defense sector also have a part of their activity in the civil sector, especially in aeronautics, very strongly affected by the pandemic.
The sector, brought together within the Council of French Defense Industries (Cidef) thus judges a plan to revive the economy "fundamental" , from which it would benefit. Without mentioning it formally, Florence Parly indicates that the government seems favorable. Prime Minister Edouard Philippe "gave elements of response by saying that defense investment is built in the long term, that the world in which we live will be neither less dangerous nor less risky, as the current period shows" , she recalls. "None of the analyzes which founded the choices of the LPM (Law of military programming, note) were invalidated" , she added.
Read also: Defense: industrialists want a recovery
The 2019-2025 LPM provides for an increase in the capacity of the French armies. It forecasts a budget of 295 billion euros (including 172.8 billion for equipment) over the period, including 39.3 billion in 2021.
