"France: "Public/private synergies in the spotlight"

As is traditional, the beginning of the summer period was marked by the Ordinary General Assembly of Saint-Charles Export.

Mr. Ludovic Pacaud, Secretary General of the Prefecture, was the guest of honour at this 12th Assembly, the objective of which was to highlight the many existing “public/private” synergies within the and Saint-Charles grouping and platform.

In the preamble to this meeting, the current topics of the Saint-Charles platform and the sectors of fruit and vegetables, transport and logistics were presented succinctly, as Julien Batlle, President of Saint-Charles Export explained, “the answers and the solutions can only be collegial and collective”.

In fact, beyond the traditional activity report and the presentation of the accounts, the platform representatives were eager to show the important role played by the various public and control authorities present at Saint-Charles, making it a veritable agro-food safety platform. 

Authorities responded massively at the invitation of Saint-Charles Export. Representatives and participants in the debates were: the RNM (Market News Network), the DRAAF (Regional Directorate for Food, Agriculture and Forestry), the Customs, the DDPP (Departmental Directorate for the Protection of Populations), the DIRECCTE (Regional Directorates for Enterprises, Competition, Consumption, Labour and Employment), the DGCCRF (General Directorate for Competition, Consumption and Fraud Control), the Bank of France and the Employment Centre (Pôle Emploi). This is proof of the importance of the "public/private" synergies within the Saint-Charles ecosystem.

Thus, all the participants in this Assembly were able to share their views, their solutions and their hopes on the various subjects of current interest that were raised, including land, the layout of the platform as a whole, the location for the implementation of phytosanitary controls, taxation, dematerialisation of procedures, multimodality, employment, training and human resources. 

To summarise these different topics, Julien Batlle reminded us that “the support of the state administrations will be crucial for the competitiveness of our companies and the attractiveness of our territory ... new challenges are facing us, where ‘public/private’ synergies should, and will, make the difference in an increasingly competitive world ... and only together can we succeed and meet all these challenges,“ concluding his comments with a quote from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry “revisited” for the occasion, “TO ADVANCE does not mean to look at each other; it means to look together in the same direction”.

This General Assembly was also an opportunity to recall the many actions undertaken by Saint-Charles Export since its creation in 2007 -”concrete and effective actions, oriented towards export markets, in a spirit of economic competitiveness and territorial attractiveness“.

Within this group, the public contribution is the “binder” that enables all the actions to be set in place and promotes the participation of any member company: VSEs as well as SMEs.

Since 2007, the territorial institutions of the Region, the Department and the Urban Community have been the common denominator that has made it possible to federate and associate producers, importers/exporters, transporters and logisticians, in order to set up a common strategy on export markets.

Thus, participants were reminded of the investment of Perpignan Mediterranean Metropolis and the Occitania Pyrenees-Mediterranean Region, which are among the main sponsors of this dynamic and allow the group to maintain its range of activities and pursue its objectives.

As for the Department, with the support of the Regional Council of Occitania, it is a driving force in the creation of the future Regional Logistics Cluster with which the Saint-Charles platform is associated.

This General Assembly made it possible to express appreciation to Crédit Agricole Sud Méditerranée and the Banque Populaire du Sud, founding members of Saint-Charles Export, for their contributions and support in all the approaches and activities carried out by the group. 

It was also the opportunity to remind the participants, after these various expressions of appreciation, that Saint-Charles Export is itself a good example of "public/private" synergy for the development of our territory, the attractiveness of the Saint-Charles platform and the competitiveness of regional companies in the sectors of fruit and vegetables, transport and logistics.

After over 2 hours of discussions and presentations, during which he did not “notice the time passing”, the Secretary General of the Prefecture, Mr. Ludovic PACAUD, closed this 12th Ordinary General Assembly of Saint-Charles Export by “assuring Saint-Charles professionals of the unfailing support of the services of the Prefecture and the various State authorities”, while stating that, “the State supports the professionals of the platform on all the subjects mentioned”.