Laurent Saint-Martin, director general of Business France, the national agency serving the internationalization of the French economy, was the eco guest of franceinfo, Wednesday October 4.
At the end of August, thee Minister Delegate for Foreign Trade and Attractiveness, Olivier Becht announced the Dare to Export plan which devotes a budget of 125 million euros to support companies that export or wish to do so. Airbus and Bordeaux wines are the champions of France, which exports well internationally.
Laurent Saint-Martin, general director of Business France, the national agency serving the internationalization of the French economy, was the eco guest of franceinfo.
franceinfo: Today, French companies that export internationally only concern a few sectors. How can we ensure that other sectors also go international?
First by reindustrializing, by producing in France. You know, when you outsource, it’s a double whammy, you no longer have the means to export and on the contrary you import the products. And that’s why France has such a large trade deficit [ndlr 8 milliards d’euros en juillet dernier]. And so, to ward off this, we must first reindustrialize with the France 2030 plan, 54 billion euros, affirmed sectoral priorities, in particular the decarbonization of industry. We will give ourselves the means, it will take years. We will give ourselves the means to reproduce more at home in order to be able to export tomorrow. And then we also need to have more companies that are launching exports, that dare to export. We absolutely must move away from an idea too often widespread in France that “exporting is not for me”. I am an SME with a turnover of 10 million euros. “Exporting is too complicated” is a French evil that must be warded off.
Half of the value of international exports come from large companies. Do SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises) and ETIs (Intermediate Sized Enterprises) share the rest?
Absolutely. And we have a very good network of SMEs in our country. And these SMEs need to get started, but for that, they need to be supported. They need Business France, they need other players. We called it the Team France Export. There are several of us on this team. There are also chambers of commerce. There is also Bpifrance and so we are together precisely to support the business manager. Because yes, it’s difficult. Yes, it is an investment to export. But when it works, it pays off immensely. The France Export Team is at work. But to believe that only the one-stop shop for support staff would resolve the issue is an illusion. It is also necessary that culturally, in our country, we focus more on exports, so we reindustrialize, as we have said, it is the sine qua non condition. But more companies also need to get involved. There are approximately 145,000-150,000 exporting SMEs today in France. We need to set a course. Minister Olivier Becht gave 200,000 exporting companies by 2030. This is what we must aim for. And for that, there is no miracle. We have to go see them. We need to go door to door with business leaders and all those who are listening to us this evening, all the companies, all the small start-ups that are not yet international , they are going to see Business France tomorrow morning and we will support them.
The Minister Delegate in charge of Foreign Trade, Olivier Becht, launched a plan called Dare to Export for SMEs and tools, with 125 million euros. What is this money used for?
It is used to help businesses that are still hesitant. So we can help them financially to get started, in particular, you know, by going to places where we connect business, the major sectoral thematic fairs which are very important all over the world to get to know the first buyers. We go with them, we organize it, we have the France pavilion at major world trade shows and we subsidize the participation of companies. We are going to push this subsidy to 30%. So that is very, very concrete. We will also bring foreign buyers to France. We must not forget that export actually begins in our French regions. So we bring buyers to France. We will also push our SMEs more on commerce, digital, what we call marketplaces in good French. And so there is a whole series of measures like that which mean that we will strengthen the range of support tools by financing more. And we are also going to diversify into support solutions. But today, I repeat, a boss of an SME of VSE who is not exporting, is a boss to whom we have not yet sufficiently demonstrated the opportunities for growth, turnover , margins, technological partnerships, et cetera, which he absolutely must seize.
Where do you advise them to export?
Depending on each sector, depending on each country, the support method will differ because the legal and technical complexity of approaching local buyers will be different. And that is our business, our Business France expertise, 1,500 employees trained by profession, by geographic sector. We are present in 80 offices around the world precisely to make this business connection. So we will diagnose this need with the business manager. Don’t forget that you can also be very successful in major exports. Very far away, in the Indo-Pacific for example. Latin America and Africa are fantastic opportunities for many French companies that want to export. So the question of destination will come in due time when we have diagnosed the export potential of these companies. But first, I insist, culturally, we are unlocking this French barrier which is that export is not for me. If it’s for everyone. Everyone has the possibility of export success and everyone must take this step. This really must be the new great economic cause of our country. If we really want to have this positive trade balance tomorrow. Because that is a sign of prosperity for a country.