Europe has "
perhaps gone too far in industrial relocations
" but has realized the importance of industrial sovereignty during the Covid-19 pandemic, French Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire said on Thursday. in front of an audience of senior European officials in Paris.
Read alsoBruno Le Maire links “national prosperity” to reindustrialisation
"
We realized that we had perhaps gone too far in industrial relocations, we had gone too far in abandoning our economic sovereignty, we had gone too far in sharing global value, with an idea now outdated that everything that can happen cheaper must happen elsewhere
, ”said the Minister, at the opening of a European conference on industrial sovereignty in Bercy, with notably the Vice-President of the Commission Maros Sefcovic.
The minister, who was speaking within the framework of the French presidency of the Council of the EU, referred to certain shortages that affected the Old Continent at the height of the pandemic, from FFP2 masks to active ingredients of medicines via semiconductors present in cars, and still subject to enormous stress on the world market today.
"A new economic model"
“
We understood that sovereignty had a price and that it was good to pay
it,” said the minister. "
Not only does it make no sense to relocate a production to earn a euro cent per piece, it does not make economic sense, but it is socially costly and it is exorbitant from an environmental point of view
" , he continued, stressing that Europe intended to build “
a new economic model
” and no longer wanted “
growth for growth
”.
In a time of shortages and disrupted supply chains, France wants to take advantage of its rotating European presidency to accelerate several large investment projects allowing member states to derogate from competition rules by directly subsidizing industries of the future strategic, in order to compete with the American and Chinese giants through the emergence of continental champions.
To read also Bruno Le Maire: "Those who rehash the refrain of decline are the first promoters"
These projects, which will be financed via a European instrument with the barbaric name of "
Piiec
", - which Bruno Le Maire has proposed to rename - relate to the fields of hydrogen, health, the cloud, electronics (semi -conductors) and electric batteries.
On the already well advanced battery file, which was the subject of a first Piiec, Bruno Le Maire reported 60 billion euros released representing 70 industrial projects, including that of the plant planned in Douvrin in the northern France, "
the first stone of which will be laid in the coming months
".
