What will the French retail landscape look like in 2030? To focus on the evolution of the sector, the minister in charge of SMEs and trade, Olivia Grégoire, announced the creation of a National Trade Council (CNC). It will be piloted by the former Secretary of State for Simplification Thierry Mandon, announced the minister in an interview with Sunday newspaper.
“He will meet all the players and, together, we will define a roadmap, with concrete and rapid proposals from June”said Olivia Grégoire.
Transforming Commerce
Purpose of this new body, to deal with the “deep changes” encountered by the sector against a backdrop of the boom in online commerce, global warming and the biodiversity crisis. If today 72% of the expenditure of the French people is always carried out in commercial zones, the minister points out that these “concentrate energy sieves, generate heat islands, consume agricultural and forest areas to the detriment of biodiversity and are sometimes unsightly”.
“With the CNC and all the players, I want us to imagine their transformation to rebuild a business that fits into a place of life, densified and mixed with housing, services and offices, all with signatures innovative architectural and environmental solutions”she continued.
Experiments in 2023
The project should be endowed with an envelope of 24 million euros initially, to finance 10 to 30 demonstrator projects in 2023. The Minister however specified that “The State will not finance this transformation alone but will stimulate it with local authorities and accelerate it”.
The announcement was welcomed on Twitter by Jacques Creyssel, general delegate of the Federation of commerce and distribution (FCD). During the trade conference in December 2021, he insisted on the investment needs for the transformation of the sector. “The State must help us, within the framework of a 2030 trade plan as there was a plan for industry”he pleaded then.
Revitalize city centers
Between 2018 and 2022, the State had already launched a program, “Action heart of the city”, dedicated to the revitalization of the centers of medium-sized cities. 20% of the envelope of 5 billion euros had gone to trade. A new part is in preparation. During the previous five-year term, the former Prime Minister Jean Castex announced an extension of the system until 2026.