The alternating annual visits of the French and Quebec Prime Ministers will resume, after a four-year hiatus. This was announced on Wednesday in Paris by the new Minister of International Relations of Quebec, Martine Biron, as part of the launch of the Year of Franco-Quebec Innovation 2023. French Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne , will therefore visit Quebec in the spring on a date yet to be determined.
On the way to Djerba, where the 18e Summit of the Francophonie on November 19 and 20, Martine Biron had made a point of reserving for France her first trip abroad in order to mark, she says, “the primordial importance of this relationship”. Accompanied by the Minister Delegate for Foreign Trade, Olivier Becht, she unveiled the content of the Year of Franco-Quebec Innovation 2023, which will see French and Quebec companies intensify their cooperation in cutting-edge sectors for its entire duration. .
In my role as Minister of International Relations and La Francophonie, you will see me more on French territory
During this year, more than twenty French delegations, made up of entrepreneurs, researchers and academics, will visit Quebec, and about as many Quebec delegations will do the same in France. These delegations will go not only to the big cities, but also to the regions.
Thus, French companies will actively participate in Smart Electric Transport Week next March in Montreal as well as in the Annual Congress of the Association francophone pour le savoir in May. In return, many Quebec researchers and entrepreneurs will be invited to take part in the International Cybersecurity Forum, in April in Lille, the International Symposium on Digital Creation, in May in Paris, and the Viva Technology trade show, in June in Paris.
“A strategic choice”
“We need today to reaffirm the transatlantic link and to reaffirm the almost ancestral fundamental link that we have between France and Quebec,” declared Minister Olivier Becht. According to him, “the Year of Franco-Quebec Innovation shows that we are not only in the revival of a bond of friendship […]but that we are in fact also a lever for the French economy and the Quebec economy”.
For Martine Biron, it is a question of sending a clear message in order to affirm the importance of the France-Quebec relationship. These relations “have never been interrupted, but we want to occupy more territory”. Her coming to France immediately after her appointment is “a strategic choice”, she says. She wants to reaffirm that “France is an essential partner for us”. “In my role as Minister of International Relations and La Francophonie, you will see me more on French territory. »
Among the forty French and Quebec personalities gathered at the Quai d’Orsay, the president of Investissement Québec International, Hubert Bolduc, seemed particularly delighted. “We have very attractive sectors for French companies, I am thinking of artificial intelligence, quantum research and the whole battery sector. On the other hand, France excels, among other things, in artificial intelligence, micro-nuclear power plants and wind power. »
Minister Biron also met on Tuesday with the French Minister of National Education, Pap Ndiaye, with whom she chaired the 68e board of directors of the Office franco-québécois pour la jeunesse. In the evening, she participated in a reception at the General Delegation which brought together more than a hundred French and Quebec personalities. The minister will be in Djerba on Thursday, where Prime Ministers Justin Trudeau and François Legault are expected.