You have understood that the third key to our sovereignty is this foreign policy, this partnership with Africa, this development policy that must guide us in founding a farreaching project based on mutual investment, education, health and energy. If Europe fails to seize this opportunity, others will and if nothing is done, Europe alone will face all of the consequences.
The fourth key to our sovereignty is being able to address the first of the major global transformations, the ecological transition. This total transformation is revolutionizing the way we produce, redistribute and behave. Today Europe is in a period in between, but our choice is simple: do we want to continue producing as we have in the past, and defend a competitiveness against powers that are making this choice or have already done so, or do we wish to push forward and become leaders of a new production model that will not only be a model for the economy, but also a model for society and civilization, enabling a fresh perspective on inequalities and externalities of a society whose main victims of imbalances are the weakest and most vulnerable?
I have made my choice: I deeply believe that Europe must be a pioneer of an effective and equitable ecological transition. For this to happen, we need to transform our transport, our housing, our industries. For this to happen, we need to invest and provide powerful incentives for this transformation. It is first necessary to establish a fair carbon price, one that is high enough to ensure this transition. Here too, there will be a fight. Here too, there will be lobbies, resistance saying that it is a good idea but only a few euros. In the coming years, if we do not have a significant carbon price per tonne so as to develop very different directions for our economies, then it will be pointless.
Studies have shown that anything below €25 to €30 per tonne is not effective. It is towards this goal that we should work, and starting today, we must get organized to do so — this is crucial. A significant floor price, a genuine single price, a genuine transition to trigger this transformation of our economies, supporting sectors in need, supporting regions that will be victims of these changes with contracts designed to best address the needs on the ground that will help to promote regions where outdated production models are the most prevalent so that they can benefit from the creation of new jobs.
This transition also means having a European energy market that really works, therefore finally wanting and fostering interconnections. For a long time, we slowed their progress, here too, because it was not necessarily one of our core corporate interests. We need, with Spain, with Portugal, with all of our neighbours, to develop these interconnections. Why? Because in certain seasons, when renewable energy is produced in large quantities, we must ensure that all of Europe benefits. At other times, when nuclear energy is indispensable, lowcarbon — nocarbon — and lowcost, we must also pool the benefits. We will have a European energy market that functions more efficiently if at last we swiftly develop these interconnections.
If this strategy is to be successful, we must also ensure that our manufacturers that are most exposed to globalization are on an equal footing with competing companies and industries from other regions in the world that do not have the same environmental requirements. That is why we should have a European border carbon tax; it is crucial.
