France recorded in 2021 the worst trade deficit in its history, at 84.7 billion euros.
An ambitious goal. While France suffered the worst trade deficit in its history in 2021, Bruno Le Maire showed on Tuesday his desire for the country to return to the green over the next decade. “We have with Franck Riester (the Minister Delegate in charge of Foreign Trade and Attractiveness) the very firm determination to meet this challenge within ten years, and to return to what the situation was before the 2000s: a trade surplus“Launched the Minister of the Economy on BFM Business.
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“It is possible for France, it goes through reindustrialization“, added the tenant of Bercy. Indeed, he sees French deindustrialization as the main factor in the French trade deficit, and “the black point today of the French economic situation“.
A renationalization of EDF not ruled out
“By dint of deindustrializing the country, by dint of no longer conquering markets, because we have not invested enough in industry, you are losing market share, you are losing ground, and you end up with a balance very loss-making business“, he lamented. Of 84.7 billion euros precisely in 2021, or 3.4% of GDP, announced the Customs last week. The previous record dated back to 2011: the trade balance then fell into the red at 75 billion euros.
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In addition, Bruno Le Maire also reacted to the difficulties encountered by EDF and on the projects entrusted to him by the State, in particular the construction of six new EPR reactors. “To accompany this load plan, we must support EDF“, indicated the Minister of the Economy. Asked about a possible renationalization of the energy company, the Bercy tenant assured that “no options [devait] to be discarded“. “All options are on the table“, he repeated. At the beginning of the year, Bercy had nevertheless indicated that this scenario was not “on the table“.