He speaks in a calm voice of his departure from the Ministry of Culture and his arrival at that of Foreign Trade as Minister Delegate of Jean-Yves Le Drian. Shortly after being disembarked from Rue de Valois - where he would have liked to stay - Franck Riester shows no regret or animosity towards a sector with which he had difficulties since his appointment at the end of 2018.
On the contrary, he understands that the Head of State needed to "change heads" . Serene, he paints an almost pleasant picture of these nineteen months, “including four of Covid”, spent in Culture. He says he is satisfied with having passed seven laws or obtained 5 billion for a sector which has been decimated by the coronavirus. He would have liked to go to the end of the audiovisual reform, for which he scrapped a lot, but he does not extend ...
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In any case, he says he is happy to have joined the prestigious Quai d'Orsay, "of which he becomes number two" , specifies his entourage. Assures him that the subjects of economic diplomacy fascinate him, that the internationalization of companies and the influence of the Hexagon constitute "a growth potential not to be neglected".
He is pleased that these subjects, "dear to the President of the Republic" , find - this was no longer the case since 2017 - a dedicated ministry and confides that this is not the first time that he is eyeing it. And Franck Riester to recall that he carried out part of his studies in New York and Tokyo. Before joining the firm Arthur Andersen then recovering, in 2000, the family business of Peugeot car dealerships.
Meeting with Fabius, Idrac and Fekl
The former LR mayor of Coulommiers, close to Édouard Philippe and Bruno Le Maire, knows that foreign trade, whose balance has been in the red for fifteen years now, he will have anything but the easy task. "But where is it easy at the moment?", Coward with reason this 46-year-old man who was excluded from his party in October 2017 for being closer to Emmanuel Macron.
In the first half of the year, the trade deficit widened to 34 billion euros, seven more than in 2019 over the same period, according to the Customs statement. Between closed borders, slower production or plummeting demand, obstacles have multiplied during confinement for companies selling abroad and they have not been able to keep up with the same export rates.
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To familiarize himself with the challenges of his new ministry, Franck Riester has not hesitated in recent weeks to meet several of his predecessors, and in particular Laurent Fabius, Anne-Marie Idrac or Matthias Fekl. He hopes to talk about it in the coming days with Christine Lagarde, the president of the ECB, who held this post between 2005 and 2007, of which he is the neighbor during the holidays. Before a return to school where he will work, in particular, to set to music the export component of the recovery plan that will be presented on August 25.