Arnaud Montebourg, Minister of Industrial Renewal of France, supports “Get Caught Reading”

I chose La Carte et le Territoire by Michel Houellebecq. Since its publication in 2010, I have been stricken by the France described by Houellbecq. He pictures, with his very own cynical irony, a contemporary world focused on a consuming, immaterial economy and financial power. His description of a post-industrial France is full of deep melancholy, resignation even. The France Michel Houellebecq is offering at the end of his story is a country with a destroyed production, the services economy is now Queen. France is becoming a huge tourist resort, “Hotel Resort and Spa”, known for its wines, its cuisine, its castles, its landscapes and its museums, says Mr Arnaud Montebourg, Minister of Industrial Renewal of France.
This destiny falling upon our country is the one I’m fighting against at the Ministry of Industrial Renewal. A country which doesn’t produce anymore is in the hands of the countries producing. A nation abandoning its industry is doomed into submission to others, impoverishment and decline. As an agricultural engineer, Michel Houellebecq does know this well, added Mr Montebourg.
France holds in its hands human treasures of technological genius, from engineers, researchers, entrepreneurs. We are at the dawn of a third industrial revolution which is the result of a countless number of new technologies that will change our lives. If we know how to accompany and nurture them in France, this revolution will create new jobs, new technologies, and the future items of our daily lives. It’s up to the State and the Ministry I’m representing to mobilise and give prospects to the productive forces of our country, said Mr Montebourg.