The “Tour de France of our industries” makes a stop in Occitanie

– – – Le « Tour de France de nos industries »

Restore the image of French industry to attract talent, such is the ambition of the « Tour de France of our industries »  piloted by Bpifrance. In the colors of the French fab, a bus goes from region to region to meet middle school, high school and university students to present to them the industrial world of today, a combination of innovation and technicality. On October 15, it will be in Béziers then Toulouse.

As part of a vast tour of France, it is the turn of middle school, high school and university students from Occitanie to be taken on October 15 to discover an industrial company established in their territory.

They will be taken there aboard a bus in the colours of French Fab and its inseparable blue rooster, a symbol of French industrial know-how. Students from the Françoise Giroux middle schools in Vendres and Jules Ferry middle schools in Cazouls-lès-Béziers, in the east of the region, will board in the morning to discover the site of the glassmaker OI. In the afternoon, the bus will head to Toulouse to pick up students in boilermaking and machining from the Icam engineering school and take them to the Siane, the industry trade fair.

A challenge of reindustrialisation

« The blue rooster of the French Fab represents the French team of the reindustrialization of the country”, summarizes Julien Noronha, director of communications of the public investment bank Bpifrance, pilot of the project.
« The observation that was made is that there is a real problem of deindustrialization in the country and this has been the case for 40 years. The challenge is to remedy it. To achieve this, it is imperative to restore the image of industry in France, which is still too often associated with assembly line work and the darkness of production sites. All this does not allow the 60,000 open positions to find candidates, companies are struggling to recruit, » he continues, emphasizing the role of Bpifrance, whose mission is to facilitate the creation of new industrial sites – « “We need about a hundred creations per year, we are at 40”, notes Julien N -, while supporting the ecological transition as well as the development of export sales.

Attracting talent

A tailored approach for each student profile:

For middle school students, the goal will be to show them the different professions in industry « with a major speech to girls to encourage them to go into mathematics, » insists the Bpifrance communications director. With high school students, the speech will be more focused on training courses and the careers that can be obtained. As for post-baccalaureate students, we will very specifically seek to recruit in construction, engineering schools, and business schools, depending on the areas concerned.

In total, the Tour de France of industry will stop on twelve dates and around twenty industrial sites will be visited.
« Medical, industrial furnace, high technology, medicine, textile…: we diversify the sectors represented as much as possible. All sectors are concerned by this need for reindustrialization because we are on a real issue of sovereignty », insists Julien Noronha. For each date, nearly 200 young people will be able to touch the reality of the industrial world.

4000 young people on the tour

Over the entire tour, this represents nearly 4000 young people.
« At the start, the young people look at us with wide eyes. So we ask them how they see the industry, where they want to work ? Many answer us “at L’Oréal“ without knowing that it is industry! Same thing with the chip in their phone, we make them realize that it is industry. “

Another great opportunity for young people taking part in this industry tour of France: meeting the bosses of mid-sized companies.
“By meeting them, young people can gauge the proximity of these leaders to their teams, and the profiles of people who are very committed to their territory where life is often good. All this must be shown because it gives meaning,” adds Julien Noronha.