Over 85,000 People Strike And March! Power Outages, Factories Shut Down, Traffic Blocked

Strikes lead to force majeure

Will affect the supply of factory products

According to local French media reports, French labor unions held a large-scale strike across the country on Thursday (January 27), with more than 170 protests and demonstrations, calling for wage increases to cope with the rising cost of living. In the months leading up to the presidential election, factory workers, railroad workers, power workers and others in various industries are pressuring the government.

France's four main unions (CGT, FO, FSU and Solidaires) are behind the strike, and they want higher wages, especially for minimum wage workers and those in the public sector.

"We think this will be bigger than the strike on October 5," Céline Verzeletti of the CGT told AFP, referring to more than 85,400 people who attended according to the interior ministry (160,000 according to the CGT).

I still remember that the strikes of major factories such as INEOS and Arkema at the end of 2021 directly led to the suspension of local chemical and plastic production. At that time, the two companies directly sent a letter stating that the force majeure caused by the strike would affect the supply of products in the French factories of the above-mentioned companies, and the recovery time is unknown.

Union leaders have called for a higher minimum wage, which they say has not been raised since President Macron took office. They also want to reassess wages and pension funds in the inflation-hit public service sector, which rose 2.8% in December.

"Stop telling us that wages are the enemy of work," Yves Veyrier from the FO union told AFP.

Electricity production decreased by about 4.2%

will seriously affect the production of industrial enterprises

To make matters worse, nuclear power generation in France fell by 2.2GW and hydropower by 1.3GW due to a strike by power workers, according to EDF figures on Wednesday.

This also means that France's electricity production has decreased by about 4.2%, which will seriously affect the production of industrial enterprises. Reuters reported that France was expected to be a net importer of electricity throughout the day, according to RTE data.

It is reported that around 11 am on January 25, dozens of French energy sector union members burned tires and hung banners outside the Cordemais coal mine in western France to express their strike.

Mathieu Pineau, a representative of the CGT union, said: "Today, we are mobilized, of course because the EDF has achieved record results and we want to reap the fruits of our work." Plans to sell cheap energy to rivals at low prices will affect EDF's performance.

The CGT called for a strike late last year after it deemed the outcome of wage negotiations in the energy sector unsatisfactory. Several locations, including the EDF-operated Codemais coal mine, were blocked by striking workers on Tuesday.

According to the analysis of local energy experts, if the average temperature drops next and the energy problem is not solved, there may be a direct power outage in Europe in the next few months.

Affected by the strike

Transportation is almost completely blocked

Other public transport lines were affected by the strike. In particular, the transport between Bordeaux-Toulouse is almost completely blocked, and several RER and Transilien (Ile-de-France Regional Railway) lines are expected to be disrupted. In France, railways are one of the main means of freight transport.

In 2020, the French "La Le Roix" pointed out that during the epidemic prevention and control period, railway freight has played a very important role, reflecting huge development potential. In order to further improve the competitiveness of railway transportation, the French government will carry out a structural reorganization of railway freight. By 2022, the French government will allocate billions of euros for the upgrading of the railway system. The plan is part of the French government's "green recovery" plan. French Minister of Economy and Finance Le Maire said: "The green recovery plan will create more jobs in different fields, accelerate the pace of economic recovery after the epidemic while helping the ecological transformation.

Currently affected by the strike, the SNCF has announced that more than 85% of TGV trains between Paris and Bordeaux will be cancelled. However, the railway company said: "The TGV will guarantee five round-trip journeys between Paris and Bordeaux, representing about 15% of the normal service, for those who need to travel on the same day."

Even multiple politicians will join the march, including Fabien Roussel, the presidential candidate of the French Communist Party (PCF), Yannick Jadot of the Green Party (EELV), the far left Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the French Indomitable (LFI), and Socialist Party candidate Anne Hidalgo.

CFDT union leader Lauren t Berger said his group was not involved in the strike but supported the need for higher wages, especially for "second-tier" workers. "It's only the addition of concrete, targeted initiatives that will yield results ... not these massive inter-union protests," he told AFP. "Everyone's in the same bag, it just doesn't work. ."

Instead, his union will stage a separate protest of lower-level workers in Paris on February 3.