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France Telecom Group Business Information, Profile, and History

6 place d'Alleray
75740 Paris Cedex 15
France

Company Perspectives:

We intend to be a world-class service enterprise that is universally recognized for both the quality of our network and the quality of our customer relationships. To achieve this, we have made concrete commitments to all our customers--residential customers, small businesses and large corporations. Because each of these customer segments has specific expectations, our commitments are equally specific. What they all share, though, is a focus on delivering exactly what each customer wants and needs. France Telecom also intends to remain faithful to its values as a provider of public service, treating each customer with the same consideration and providing the same high quality for all of them.

History of France Telecom Group

The fourth largest telecommunications corporation in the world, France Telecom Group is also one of the last remaining state-owned telecommunications monopolies--but not for long. Faced with the January 1, 1998 elimination of telecommunications monopolies foreseen by the European Union, France Telecom has been preparing its privatization, if only to remain competitive with the coming open season on this last bastion of Europe's telecommunications market. As part of its preparations, France Telecom has restructured its operations into three operational branches (Mass Market, Corporate Market, and Networks) and two functional branches (Resources and Development). On January 1, 1996, the company's statute was changed, reforming the company as a "société anonyme" (SA), preparing the way for the France Telecom's quotation on the Paris Bourse. Initially scheduled to occur in June, the company's first public offering was postponed--however temporarily.

Early History

The history of French telecommunications is largely that of political intervention in scientific progress. As early as 1837, five years after Samuel Morse conceived his system of electromagnetic telegraphy, the Morse Code, and when Carl von Steinheil had devised an electromagnetic machine through which messages were recorded by a needle, political control over telegraphic services was sought. The French king, Louis Philippe, perhaps saw this as a logical extension of the control of the press which Charles X had initiated as part of the July Ordinances of 1830. State monopoly of telegraphic services, for military and political reasons, was finally established in 1851.

Telegraphic communication was made practicable in the mid-19th century, after scientific experiments by Andre Ampère, Karl Freidrich Gauss, Wilhelm Eduard Weber, Michael Faraday, and Steinheil in Europe, and Morse in America, concerning the relationship between light waves and electromagnetic waves. The most celebrated technical advance in telegraphy was achieved by Emile Baudot, whose system of Rapid Telegraphy was patented in 1874. Other of Baudot's telegraphic inventions were contemporaneous with the development of the typewriter and by 1890 telegrams began to be transmitted in page form. The French Post Office gradually absorbed the telegraph service, one minister becoming responsible for both early in 1879.

From the last quarter of the 19th century the expansion of telephony in France was equally rapid. In 1880 the three private companies that the French government had licensed merged to form the Societé Générale du Telephones (SGT). The year 1883 saw the first telephone exchange installed in Rheims and 1887 the first international circuits connecting Paris to Brussels. SGT's telephone network was nationalized in September 1889, the state reserving the monopoly of telephonic developments and addressing itself to the problems of technical development with the assistance of scientists Ader and Berthon. In addition to the development of transmission equipment, work progressed on the refinement of switching equipment which automatically made the connections between the lines. In the United States, Strowger's automatic switchgear, patented in 1889, allowed subscriber connection without the interposition of a human operator. This new type of equipment became famous for its durability. The first automated exchange in France was installed in Nice in October 1913, the last being dismantled only in 1979.

Between 1890 and 1915 the number of telephones in France more than doubled every five years, from 15,432 to 357,515. However, the distribution of instruments in proportion to the population was modest. In 1911 there were 0.6 telephones per 100 people in France while in the United States there were 8.1, in Canada 3.7, in Denmark 3.5, in Sweden 3.4, and in Germany 1.6. One of the main reasons for this slow growth was the method of financing networks. The cities that wished to acquire a telephone system had to provide the administration with the initial finance. The administration later reimbursed the locality in proportion to the receipts from subscribers to the new network. Unequal distribution of telephone networks across the country, and lack of inter-regional connections, resulted from this approach.

Between the two world wars French government policy ensured that the telephone service was geared more closely to the needs of the commercial and industrial sectors, and that modern services were provided to all at the same price across the country. Originally there were many varieties of telephone sets available but a standard model was introduced in 1924. The setting of more, and better quality, lines was also begun, using underground cables. Long distance connections, already improved by the invention between 1904 and 1915 of the diode and the triode, the audion, and the hard valve lamps, were refined. Arteries of lines radiating from Paris to many regional telephone exchanges were constructed between 1924 and 1938. Finally, the replacement of manual by automatic exchanges was gradually achieved, using the rotary system.

Paris, its environs, and eventually the main provincial centers saw their exchanges automated from the 1930s. In the countryside, however, the problem of modernizing 25,000 exchanges, half of which supported less than five subscribers, had to be approached differently and a semi-automatic system resulted. Nevertheless, France still had one of the lowest ratios of telephones to people in 1938 with 3.79 percent whereas the United States had 15.27 percent, Sweden 12.47 percent, and the United Kingdom 6.74 percent. Most French telephones were used for business purposes and in the home the instrument barely penetrated below the upper middle classes. Most telephones were to be found in urban areas of northern France; elsewhere, only the exclusive resorts, such as Biarritz, Nice, and Cannes, were as well-equipped.

French telephonic, telegraphic, and radiocommunications services suffered greatly from World War II, the German occupation, and the fight for liberation. Out of 140 automatic exchanges, 39 were unusable as were 104 of the 228 manual exchanges. The cable network suffered similarly, with equipment and buildings destroyed or badly damaged. A quarter of the 105 main telegraph nodes were out of commission. Submarine lines connecting France with the United Kingdom, the United States, and Africa were destroyed, as was the huge Bordeaux-Croix d'Hins radio station.

Of the several postwar economic plans, the telecommunications sector was not given priority and between 1947 and 1966 only 0.2 percent of the country's gross national product was spent on telecommunications. However, the creation of the Centre National d'Etudes des Télécommunications--CNET, now France Télécom's research and development organization--in 1944 was all-important in encouraging further experimentation. From the mid-1940s new technical advances were made as a result of this official collaboration with the French telecommunications and electronics industry. The first coaxial links connected Paris and Toulouse in 1947 and coaxial cable gradually replaced the old paired wire. Shortly after this date, NATO finance ensured the development of transatlantic coaxial connections.

Terrestrial telecommunications technology moved apace. The old rotary switching system was replaced by the crossbar system around 1960, the new equipment being sufficiently versatile to meet the needs of all types of telecommunication, from urban to international. In the mid-1960s digital switching experiments had begun in France and by 1970 fiber optic cable began to be used to support signal transmission. This research was paralleled by work at CNET into the problems of electronic connection which resulted in the Aristote, Socrate, Périclès, and Platon systems of the 1960s and 1970s. These programs of scientific experiment investigated the problems of electronic connection. With hindsight France Télécom of the pre-1970s appears to have had an under-equipped infrastructure, due to delayed technological development which represented around 2 percent of France's gross national product. However, at that time the system began to be modernized in a long-term strategy to digitalize it. During the same period interest in space-borne telecommunications was growing and in 1962 the United States launched the Telstar satellite. Franco-American experiments resulted in the capture and broadcast of the first television signals from the United States in July 1962. The development of geostationary satellites--whose orbits keep them constantly above the same point on the earth's surface--led to the establishment of the Intelsat II fleet, which achieved full planetary coverage from 1971. France Télécom is the third largest user of these services. In 1977 Eutelsat, the European satellite organization, worked to achieve the ECS (European Communications Satellite) system. In 1979 France inaugurated a national system of space telecommunications via the Telecom I satellite which serves the domestic market. The mission sought to establish links with French overseas territories, commercial satellite links, and videocommunications. ECS was eventually inaugurated in 1983. In 1991 France Télécom was the fifth largest shareholder in Inmarsat, the international maritime satellite, which is the culmination of over 60 years of development in intercontinental radio-electronic telephone traffic.

Inching Toward the Modern Era

By 1986 France Télécom had 25 million main lines which supported the connection of 96 percent of French homes, as well as the development of many innovative products and services, such as the Teletel videotex system. From 1983 Teletel began to replace paper telephone directories and its Minitel terminals were purchased by the DGT in substantial quantities to create a largely captive market. In 1989 the Teletel system boasted a total of 85 million connection hours through 5 million terminals. The connection of Teletel to Transpac, the French national packet switching network, which handles data in the form of units or "packets" routed individually through the network, now means that subscribers throughout the country can use other services, regardless of distance. National and international business connections combining voice and text distribution via the "Numeris" ISDN system became possible, though full utilization would wait until the mid-1990s.

Such successes could be attributable to a consistent and monopolistic government policy and efficient investment in telecommunications equipment and in the supplier companies, such as the E10 digital exchanges, a way of encoding information as a series of "on" or "off" signals, made by Alcatel. By the 1990s, France's 100 percent digital phone system was among the most modern in the world. Yet events in the telecommunications world would soon overtake the company, and its monopoly--and the burdens of bureaucracy soon left the company struggling to catch up to the rest of the worldwide industry, already undergoing a process of deregulation and privatization that would transform the nature of the telecommunications business. Eyeing the success of other recently de-nationalized telephone providers, particularly the British system, renamed British Telecom, DGT adopted a new name, France Télécom, giving it at least the appearance of keeping up with modern industry trends.

Demands for full deregulation of the European telecommunications industry resulted from the Commission of the European Communities (CEC) Green Paper in 1987. In part, the inability of monopoly organizations to cope with rapid technological change, and also the need for the competition essential to support an economy driven more by information rather than production informed these moves. Once again, arguments about the provision of a universal telephone service prevailed over exclusive concentration on technological progress. However, various countries have evolved different solutions to the problems of reorganization. Whereas in the United Kingdom British Telecom opted for full privatization, France Télécom resisted this and technological advance has taken place within a monopoly environment. France Télécom nevertheless faced the loss of portions of its monopoly after 1993, under the terms of the European Community's Open Network Provision of 1989, which guaranteed to all value-added network service (VANs) providers equal access to its country's telecommunications infrastructure. The supply of terminal equipment such as telefax machines and telephone handsets, and VANs services such as home banking, would then become open to competition, although strictly licensed. Competition in the provision of computer data transfer was also to be allowed, provided that private firms did not undercut France Télécom.

The French legal act passed on July 2, 1990, on the organization of public posts and telecommunications services, transformed France Télécom (formerly Direction Générale des Télécommunications) into a public service carrier with corporate legal status. This legal reform substantially changed the contractual relations between France's national operator and its partners; from January 1, 1991, these relations became governed by the French concept of "private law." Thus France Télécom now gained budgetary, management, and organizational independence, like most of its European competitors. Yet the company remained under the guardianship--and tight control--of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. The company's monopoly status remained intact.

A frenzy of alliances and mergers would soon come to typify the French telecommunications industry in the late 1980s and 1990s, as it tried to achieve the international scale necessary to compete in new markets such as car telephones and radio telephone paging equipment. France Télécom and Matra, the recently privatized defense and electronics group, soon faced competition from France's largest private water distributor, the Compagnie Générale des Eaux, which formed a partnership with Alcatel and Nokia of Finland to offer a second national car telephone network. Again, Alcatel, the telecommunications division of the Compagnie Générale d'Electricité (CGE), absorbed ITT to form the world's second largest telecommunications venture after that of American Telephone and Telegraph. Matra, which in 1987 successfully bid with Ericsson of Sweden for control of CGCT, France's other major supplier of public switching equipment, later acquired a 15 percent stake in Société Anonyme de Télécommunications (SAT). Nevertheless, despite these incursions into its traditional market areas, France Télécom emerged as one of the world's top four public telecommunications carriers.

During the 1990s, France Télécom found itself rushing to catch up with many of the major developments in the telecommunications industry. In particular, the company was very late to the Internet table--a lateness blamed on the company's complacency with its Minitel "cash cow." But the Minitel service, which had not seen any significant technological advancement since its introduction in 1983, quickly paled in comparison to the Internet, and particularly the rise of the World Wide Web. In May 1996, France Telecom finally introduced its own Internet provider service, dubbed Wanadoo. The company also joined the growing wave of mergers and partnerships sweeping the telecommunications industry, announcing its intention to form a partnership with Deutsche Telekom and Sprint Communications, called Global One. In 1997, the company joined another joint-venture partnership, Infostrada, formed by Olivetti Corporation and Bell Atlantic, which brought the company into Italy's recently deregulated telecommunications industry. During the 1990s, France Telecom began entering other opening international markets, including Argentina, Mexico, Indonesia, Senegal, and, in 1997, Vietnam. In recognition of its own growing international nature, the company removed the accents from the spelling of its name, becoming France Telecom in 1993.

In the meantime, France Telecom--at least its management--eyed with some envy the developments of the European telecommunications industry, as country after country denationalized their telephone carriers and ended their government monopolies, a process culminating in Deutsche Telekom's deregulation in 1996. An initial attempt to end French government control of the company and bring the company to the stock market was brutally rebuffed: by France Telecom's own employees, 75 percent of whom participated in a strike protesting the move--which would end their civil servant status. The next attempt to denationalize the company waited until 1995, and again was quashed by an employee strike. But several months later, the French government passed a new law transforming the company into a société anonyme--an event that took place on January 1, 1997--creating a public company in name if not yet in fact. The date for the company's entry on the Paris Bourse, for a sale of shares worth from FFr 25 billion to 40 billion, the largest public offering ever in France, was set for June 1997.

France's government, led by the right wing, seemed at last prepared to allow France Telecom to leap into the new telecommunications era--except the national election of May 1997 brought the Socialist Party, vowing to stop, or at least postpone the public offering, to power. Placed on hold, France Telecom's public offering (which would result in the French government's stake being reduced to some 55 percent) nevertheless seemed an inevitability--and likely to occur before the European Union's January 1, 1998 deadline.

Principal Subsidiaries: Transpac; Télédiffusion de France; Télésystèmes; Télécom Systèmes Mobiles; Compagnie Auxiliaire de Télécommunications; France Cables et Radio; Entreprise Générale de Télécommunications; VTCOM; France Telecom America del Sur; France Telecom North America; France Telecom Deutschland; France Telecom Bruxelles; France Telecom Espana; France Telecom Italia; France Telecom Polska; France Telecom Praha (Czech Republic); France Telecom UK; France Telecom Moskow; France Telecom Nordic (Sweden); France Telecom Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast); France Telecom China; France Telecom India; France Telecom Jakarta (Indonesia); France Telecom Japan K.K.; France Telecom Vietnam.

Related information about France

Official name Republic of France, Fr République Française

Local name France Timezone GMT +1 Area 551 000 km²/212 686 sq mi population total (2002e) 59 440 000 Status Republic Capital Paris Languages French (official), Breton, Occitan and Alsatian are also spoken Ethnic groups Celtic and Latin origin (91%), Breton, Catalan, and large immigrant population (including Portuguese, Algerian, Moroccan, and Arab minorities) Religions Roman Catholic (90%), Protestant (4%), Muslim (3%), Jewish (1%) Physical features Bounded S and E by large mountain ranges, notably (interior) the Massif Central, Jura, and Alps (E), rising to 4807 m/15 771 ft at Mont Blanc, and the Pyrénées (S); chief rivers include Loire (longest at 1020 km/633 mi), Rhône, Seine, Garonne; 60% of land arable. Climate Mediterranean climate in S, with warm, moist winters and hot, dry summers; average temperatures, 3°C (Jan), 18°C (Jul); continental climate in E; average annual rainfall 786 mm/31 in; heatwave caused deaths of many elderly people, August 2003. Currency 1 euro (EUR) = 100 cents (previous to February 2002, 1 French Franc (FRF) = 100 centimes). Economy Main industries include wine, fruit, cheese; perfume, textiles, clothing; steel, chemicals, machinery, cars, aircraft; natural resources of coal, iron ore, bauxite, timber; tourism important. GDP (2002e) $1·558 tn, per capita $26 000 Human Development Index (2002) 0·928 History Celtic-speaking Gauls dominant by 5th-c BC; part of Roman Empire, 125 BC to 5th-c AD; feudal monarchy founded by Hugh Capet, 987; Plantagenets of England acquired several territories, 12th-c; lands gradually recovered in Hundred Years' War, 1337–1453, apart from Calais (regained in 1558); Capetian dynasty followed by the Valois, from 1328, and the Bourbons, from 1589; Wars of Religion, 1562–95; monarchy overthrown by the French Revolution, 1789; First Republic declared, 1792; French Revolutionary Wars 1793–99; First Empire, ruled by Napoleon, 1804–14; monarchy restored, 1814–48; Second Republic, 1848–52, and Second Empire, 1852–70, ruled by Louis Napoleon; Third Republic, 1870–1940; great political instability between World Wars, with several governments holding office for short periods; occupied by Germany 1940–4, with pro-German government at Vichy, and Free French in London under de Gaulle; Fourth Republic, 1946; war with Indo-China, 1946–54; conflict in Algeria, 1954–62; Fifth Republic, 1958; founder member of European Union (formerly EC), 1958; referendum on European Union constitution rejected, May 2005; governed by a President, an appointed Prime Minster, a Council of Ministers, bicameral National Assembly, and Senate.

France ( in French), officially the French Republic (, ), is a country whose metropolitan territory is located in Western Europe and which also comprises various overseas islands and territories located in other regions.For more information, see French overseas departments, territories and collectivities. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. French people often refer to Metropolitan France as L'Hexagone (The "Hexagon") because of the geometric shape of its territory.

France is bordered by Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Monaco, Andorra, and Spain. In some of its overseas departments, France also shares land borders with Brazil, Suriname, and the Netherlands Antilles. France is also linked to the United Kingdom via the Channel Tunnel, which passes underneath the English Channel (La Manche in French).

The French Republic is a democracy which is organised as a unitary semi-presidential republic. France is also a founding member of the United Nations, and a member of La Francophonie, the G8, and the Latin Union. see World Tourism Rankings.
The name France originates from the Franks, a Germanic tribe that occupied the region after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. More precisely, the region around Paris, called Île-de-France, was the original French royal demesne. French: la Métropole, France métropolitaine or informally l'hexagone) is located in Western Europe, France is also constituted from a number of territories in North America, the Caribbean, South America, the southern Indian Ocean, the Pacific Ocean, and Antarctica (sovereignty claims in Antarctica are governed by the Antarctic Treaty System). These territories have varying forms of government ranging from overseas département to "overseas country".

Metropolitan France possesses a wide variety of landscapes, from coastal plains in the north and west to mountain ranges in the south-east (the Alps) and the south-west (the Pyrenees). The highest point in western Europe is situated in the French Alps: Mont Blanc at 4,810 metres (15,781 ft) above sea-level. There are several other elevated regions such as the Massif Central, the Jura, the Vosges, and the Ardennes which are quite rocky and forested. France also has extensive river systems such as the Loire, the Rhône, the Garonne and the Seine.

At 674,843 km² (260,558 square miles), France is the world's 40th-largest country (after Myanmar). Metropolitan France, with 551,695 km² (213,010 square miles), is somewhat larger than Yemen and Thailand, and somewhat smaller than Kenya and the US state of Texas.

Due to its overseas departments and territories scattered on all oceans of the planet, France possesses the second-largest Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in the world, covering 11,035,000 square kilometres (4,260,000 sq mi), just behind the EEZ of the United States (11,351,000 km² / 4,383,000 sq mi), but ahead of the EEZ of Australia (8,232,000 km² / 3,178,000 sq mi).According to a different calculation cited by the Pew Research Center, the EEZ of France would be 10,084,201 square kilometres (3,893,532 sq mi), still behind the United States (12,174,629 km² / 4,700,651 sq mi), and still ahead of Australia (8,980,568 km² / 3,467,416 sq mi) and Russia (7,566,673 km² / 2,921,508 sq mi). The EEZ of France covers approximately 8% of the total surface of all the EEZs of the world, whereas the land area of the French Republic is only 0.45% of the total land area on Earth

Contrast and diversity

France is known around the world as a diverse country in its people, architectures and landscapes.fact About 50% of the French population claim to have foreign background fact, which makes France one of the most diverse countries in the world. France is also home of the highest point in Europe (Mont-Blanc 4,810 m; 15,780 ft) and the lowest point of Europe, Delta du Rhone, (-5 m; -15 ft). On the other hand, France is a highly developed country with an extensive highway network (for example: France is slightly bigger than California but its highway network is more than twice as long), 32,000 kilometres (20,000 mi) of railways (SNCF), along with modern ski resorts and gigantic malls.
France is also the country with the fastest average internet connection speed (DSL), and in 2004, for the 3rd time in a row, the French healthcare system has been ranked number one in the world by the World Health Organisation.

Image:landes.jpg|The Landes Forest Coast with its 100 mile beach.
Image:la-defense-paris-financial.jpg|La Défense, one of the financial districts of Paris
Image:thorens.jpg|A ski track in Val Thorens is part of Les Trois Vallées, the largest ski resort on earth
Image:millau viaduc.jpg|Millau Viaduct: the highest bridge on earth, the tallest pillar being only slightly smaller than the Empire State Building

History


See also: List of meanings of countries' names

The borders of modern France are roughly the same as those of ancient Gaul, which was inhabited by Celtic Gauls. Gaul was conquered by Julius Caesar in the 1st century BC, and the Gauls eventually adopted Roman speech (Latin, which evolved into the French language) and Roman culture. In the Middle Ages, the French would adopt this as a justification for calling themselves ?the Most-Christian Kingdom of France.?

In the 4th century AD, Gaul's eastern frontier along the Rhine was overrun by Germanic tribes, principally the Franks, from whom the ancient name of "Francie" was derived. Existence as a separate entity began with the Treaty of Verdun (843), with the division of Charlemagne's Carolingian empire into East Francia, Middle Francia and Western Francia. Western Francia approximated the area occupied by modern France.

The Carolingians ruled France until 987, when Hugh Capet, Duke of France and Count of Paris, was crowned King of France. His descendants, the Capetian, Valois and Bourbon dynasties progressively unified the country through a series of wars and dynastic inheritance. King Louis XVI and his wife, Marie Antoinette, were killed, along with thousands of other French citizens. Napoleon Bonaparte seized control of the Republic in 1799, making himself First Consul, and later Emperor of what is now known as the First French Empire (1804?1814). In 1830, a civil uprising established the constitutional July Monarchy followed by the Second Republic in 1848. The short-lived Second Republic ended in 1852 when Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte proclaimed the Second French Empire. Louis-Napoléon was unseated following the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 to be replaced by the Third Republic.

France had colonial possessions, in various forms, since the beginning of the 17th century until the 1960s. In the 19th and 20th centuries, its global colonial empire was the second largest in the world behind the British Empire. Including metropolitan France, the total area of land under French sovereignty reached 12,898,000 square kilometres (4,980,000 sq. The 1930s were marked by a variety of social reforms introduced by the Popular Front government.

During World War II, after a short but grievous and violent battle, France's political leadership chose to surrender to Germany and enter a policy of collaboration with the enemy, a move that some disagreed with, leading to the formation of the Free French Forces outside of France and of the French Resistance inside. France was finally liberated by the Allies in 1944.

After its liberation the country attempted to hold on to its colonial empire, the comparative economic status, population and status as a dominant nation state. The Fourth Republic was established after World War II, but was soon found too weak and unstable, and was replaced in 1958 by the current semi-presidential Fifth Republic established under General Charles de Gaulle.

In 1946, France's half-hearted attempt at regaining control of its Indochina colony resulted in the First Indochina War, which finally ended with French defeat and withdrawal in 1954. Only months later, France faced a new, and even harsher conflict in its oldest major colony, Algeria.

In recent decades, France's reconciliation and cooperation with Germany have proved central to the political and economic integration of the evolving European Union, including the introduction of the euro in January 1999. However the French electorate voted against ratification of the European Constitutional Treaty in May 2005.

Government and politics



The constitution of the Fifth Republic was approved by referendum on 28 September 1958. It greatly strengthened the authority of the executive in relation to Parliament.

Under the constitution, the President of the French Republic is elected directly by universal adult suffrage for a 5-year (originally 7-year) term. The president names the prime minister, presides over the cabinet, commands the armed forces, and concludes treaties.

The French parliament is a bicameral legislature comprising a National Assembly (Assemblée Nationale) and a Senate. The government has a strong influence in shaping the agenda of Parliament.

For the past thirty years, French politics has been characterised by two politically opposed groupings: one left-wing, centred around the French Socialist Party, and the other right-wing, centred around the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR) and its successor the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP). On 29 May 2005 the French electorate voted in the referendum with about 55% against ratification of the proposed Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe. The outcome of the vote was widely regarded as crucial for the future development of the EU, as well as for France's ability to retain leadership in Europe.

France is also a member of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), the Indian Ocean Commission (COI), an associate member of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS) and a leading member of the International Francophone Organisation (OIF) of fifty-one fully or partly French-speaking countries.

France hosts the headquarters of the OECD, UNESCO, Interpol, and the International Bureau for Weights and Measures in charge of the international metric system.

Administrative divisions

France is divided into 26 administrative régions: 22 are in metropolitan France (21 are on the continental part of metropolitan France; Historically, the cantons were also territorial collectivities with their elected assemblies.

Four of the départements are overseas départements (coterminous with the four overseas régions) which are an integral part of France (and the EU) and thus enjoy a status similar to metropolitan départments.

In addition to the 26 régions and 100 départements, the French Republic is further made up of four overseas collectivities, one sui generis collectivity (New Caledonia), and one overseas territory.

Overseas collectivities and territories form part of the French Republic, but do not form part of the EU or its fiscal area. In contrast, the four overseas régions/départements used the French franc and now use the euro.

France also maintains control over a number of small non-permanently inhabited islands in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean: Bassas da India, Clipperton Island, Europa Island, Glorioso Islands, Juan de Nova Island, Tromelin Island.

Transportation

Military


The French armed forces are divided into four branches:

  • Army (Armée de Terre)
  • Navy (Marine Nationale)
  • Air Force (Armée de l'Air)
  • Gendarmerie (Gendarmerie Nationale), a military police force which serves for the most part as a rural and general purpose police force. Since the Algerian War of Independence, conscription has been steadily reduced and was abolished by the government of Jacques Chirac in 1996.

    Among the larger European Union economies, France and the United Kingdom are the only significant spenders on defence: France with 2.6% of GDP, and the UK at 2.4%, according to 2003 figures from NATO. About 10% of France's defence budget goes toward its force de frappe, or nuclear weapons.

    Economy

    France's economy combines extensive private enterprise (nearly 2.5 million companies registered) with substantial (though declining) government intervention (see dirigisme). The government is slowly selling off holdings in France Télécom, Air France, as well as the insurance, banking, and defense industries.

    A member of the G8 group of leading industrialised countries, it ranked as the sixth-largest economy in the world in 2005, behind the United States, Japan, Germany, The People's Republic of China and the United Kingdom. France joined 10 other EU members to launch the Euro on January 1 1999, with euro coins and banknotes completely replacing the French franc in early 2002.

    According to the OECD, in 2004 France was the world's fifth-largest exporter of manufactured goods, behind the United States, Germany, Japan, and The People's Republic of China, and ahead of the United Kingdom.

    In the 2005 edition of OECD in Figures, the OECD also noted that France leads the G7 countries in terms of productivity (measured as GDP per hour worked).

    In 2004, the GDP per hour worked in France was $47.7, ranking France above the United States ($46.3), Germany ($42.1), the United Kingdom ($39.6), or Japan ($32.5).



    Despite figures showing a higher productivity per hour worked than in the US, France's GDP per capita is significantly lower than the US GDP per capita, being in fact comparable to the GDP per capita of the other European countries, which is on average 30% below the US level. Lower working hours and the reluctance to reform the labour market are mentioned as weak spots of the French economy in the view of the right and lack of government policies fostering social justice by the left. Recent government attempts at adjusting the youth labor market, to combat unemployment, have met with fierce resistance.

    With over 75 million foreign tourists in 2003, France is ranked as the first tourist destination in the world, ahead of Spain (52.5 million) and the United States (40.4 million). It features cities of high cultural interest (Paris being the foremost), beaches and seaside resorts, ski resorts, and rural regions that many enjoy for their beauty and tranquillity (green tourism).

    France has an important aerospace industry led by the European consortium Airbus and is the only European power (excluding Russia) to have its own national spaceport (Centre Spatial Guyanais). Besides these "historic" populations, new populations have migrated to France since the 19th century: Belgians, Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, Poles, Romanians, Armenians, Jews from Eastern Europe and the Maghreb, Arabs and Berbers from the Maghreb, Black Africans and Caribbeans, and Chinese, to list only the most prominent. At the moment, France is the third most populous country of Europe, behind Russia and Germany. By 2050 it is estimated that the population of the European Union (of the current 25 members) will have declined to 445 million inhabitants, of whom 17.5% will be living in France.

    According to the UNHCR, the number of people seeking political asylum in France rose by around 3 % between 2003 and 2004, while in the same period, the number of asylum applications submitted in the United States fell by about 29 %. However, in metropolitan France several regional languages (including Alsatian, Basque, Breton, Catalan, Corsican, West Flemish, Franco-Provençal dialects, Lorraine German dialect, Occitan (incl. Gascon and Provençal), and some Oïl dialects - e.g., Picard or Poitevin-Saintongeais) are also occasionally understood and spoken, mostly by elderly people. Also several languages are spoken in the overseas departments and territories: Creole languages, Amerindian languages, Polynesian languages, New Caledonian languages, Comorian . Some languages spoken by immigrants are also frequently heard, especially in large cities: Portuguese, Maghreb Arabic, several Berber languages, several languages of Sub-Saharan Africa, Turkish, several spoken variants of Chinese (most notably Wu, Cantonese, Teo Cheow, and Mandarin), Vietnamese, and Khmer are the most frequently spoken.

    Despite foreign stereotypes, many French people can speak at least one foreign language citation needed, especially in border regions such as the Pyrénées, Alsace, or the Alps. German, Spanish, Italian and English are spoken with various degrees of proficiency and many families living near the borders are perfectly bilingual.

    Language Number of people % of adult population Notes
    1
    		 French
    		 39,360,000
    		 86%
    		 The real figure for the whole population is closer to 90%, see notes.
    2
    		 German and High German varieties (Alsatian, Lorraine German, etc.)
    		 970,000
    		 2.12%
    		 Alsatian (600,000; 0.22%)
    3
    		 Arabic (essentially Maghreb Arabic)
    		 940,000
    		 2.05%
    4
    		 Oc languages (Languedocian, Gascon, Provençal, etc.)
    		 610,000
    		 1.33%
    		 Another 1,060,000 (2.32%) had some exposure.
    5
    		 Portuguese
    		 580,000
    		 1.27%
    6
    		 Oïl languages (Picard, Gallo, Poitevin-Saintongeais, etc.)
    		 570,000
    		 1.25%
    		 Another 850,000 (1.86%) had some exposure
    7
    		 Italian (and dialects)
    		 540,000
    		 1.19%
    8
    		 Spanish
    		 485,000
    		 1.06%
    9
    		 Breton
    		 280,000
    		 0.61%
    		 Another 405,000 (0.87%) had some exposure
    10
    		 About 400 other languages
    (Polish, Berber languages, East Asian, Catalan, Franco-Provençal, Corsican, Basque, etc.)
    		 2,350,000
    		 5.12%
    		 Of whom English: 115,000 (0.25% of total adult population)
    Total 45,762,000
    		 102%
    		 46,680,000 including those 2% with French and another language as mother tongues who were counted twice


    If we add up people with mother tongue and people with some exposure to the language before the age of 5, then the five most important languages in metropolitan France are (note that the percentages add up to more than 100, because many people are now counted twice):
    • French: 42,100,000 (92%)
    • Oc languages: 1,670,000 (3.65%)
    • German and German dialects: 1,440,000 (3.15%)
    • Oïl languages: 1,420,000 (3.10%)
    • Arabic: 1,170,000 (2.55%)

    Cities

    The principal cities by population include (except Île-de-France cities):

    Aix-en-Provence, Ajaccio, Albi, Amiens, Angers, Angoulême, Annecy, Antibes, Arles, Avignon, Bastia, Beauvais, Belfort, Besançon, Béziers, Blois, Cahors, Bordeaux, Bourges, Brest, Brive-la-Gaillarde, Caen, Calais, Cannes, Carcassonne, Chalon-sur-Saône, Châlons-en-Champagne, Chambéry, Charleville-Mézières, Châteauroux, Cholet, Clermont-Ferrand, Colmar, Dijon, Dunkerque, Évreux, Fréjus, Grenoble, Hyères, La Rochelle, La Roche-sur-Yon, Le Havre, Le Mans, Lille, Limoges, Lorient, Lourdes, Lyon, Marseille, Metz, Montauban, Montpellier, Mulhouse, Nancy, Nantes, Narbonne, Nice, Nîmes, Niort, Orléans, Paris, Pau, Perpignan, Poitiers, Quimper, Reims, Rennes, Roubaix, Rouen, Saint-Brieuc, Saint-Étienne, Saint-Malo, Saint-Nazaire, Saint-Quentin, Strasbourg, Tarbes, Toulon, Toulouse, Tourcoing, Tours, Troyes, Valence, Vannes, Villeneuve-d'Ascq, and Villeurbanne.

    Culture


    • Education in France
    • Sport in France
    • Académie française
    • French literature
    • French art
    • List of French people
    • Cuisine of France
    • Cinema of France
    • Music of France
    • Holidays in France
    • Social structure of France

    Marianne



    Marianne is a symbol of the French Republic.

    Religion

    Main article: Religion in France.

    Traditionally a predominantly Roman Catholic country, yet also with anticlerical leanings, France has since the 1970s been a very secular country. Statistics from an unspecified source and date given in the CIA World Factbook gives the following number: Roman Catholic 83 to 88%, Muslim 5 to 10%, Protestant 2%, Jewish 1%. A Gallup poll established that 15% of the French population attend places of worship.

    In a more recent Eurostat "Eurobarometer" poll, in 2005, 34% of French citizens responded that "they believe there is a God", whereas 27% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 33% that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, God, or life force".

    • Roman Catholicism in France
    • Islam in France


    Public health

    As of the year 2003 there are approximately 120,000 inhabitants of France who are living with AIDSwww.indexmundi.com/france/hiv_aids_people_living_with_hiv_aids.html

    Gallery


    Image:Mont_Saint_Michel_bordercropped.jpg|The Mont St Michel
    Image:Le sacre Coeur.jpg|The Sacré C?ur
    Image:Eiffel Tower from Trocadero.jpg|The Eiffel tower

    Miscellaneous topics

    • Description of the flag: three vertical bands of blue (hoist side), white, and red became the flag during the French Revolution and made popular by Marquis de Lafayette; The Treaty of Verdun in 843, which divided the Frankish Empire and created the kingdom of Francia Occidentalis (?Western Frankland?), from which France is descended, represents only the legal founding of the state. The French state has been in continuous existence since 843, among the oldest states in existence in the world, although its form of government has changed from one of a kingdom to one of a republic.
    • Although commonly associated with the French Revolution and suggested by Robespierre in December, 1790, France's motto, "Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité" was not adopted until the Revolutions of 1848 in France.


    • The national holiday of France since 1880 is the Fête Nationale (National Holiday), colloquially known as le 14 juillet, officially celebrating the Fête de la Fédération (14 July 1790) and not the storming of the Bastille (14 July 1789) as is often believed, even by a majority of French people, and is the reason why the holiday is referred to as Bastille Day in English. On the occasion of the Fête de la Fédération, celebrated exactly one year after the storming of the Bastille, all the representatives of the provinces of France gathered on the Champ de Mars in Paris in presence of the king Louis XVI and proclaimed the national unity of France. Germany considered that Alsace was a German land that had been annexed by the conquest of the French kings, while France considered that although Alsace had indeed been a conquered province in the first place, it had legitimately and freely become a part of France by the oath of 14 July 1790. It is thus no surprise that the 14th of July was proclaimed the National Holiday of France in 1880, 9 years after Germany had detached Alsace-Lorraine from France.
      Despite being associated with the Fête de la Fédération, 14 July irked many French monarchists, to whom it recalled the bloody memory of the storming of the Bastille. French monarchists used to wear a black armband each 14 July in defiance of the National Holiday.
      • The Mont-Saint-Michel is one of the most visited tourist sites in France (a smaller version being St Michael's Mount in Cornwall, England.) Other very popular and well-known tourist sites include: Louvre Museum, Eiffel Tower, Palace of Versailles, Palace of the Popes, Avignon, Disneyland Resort Paris, Centre Pompidou, the châteaux of the Loire Valley, the ski resorts of the French Alps, Tahiti and the lagoons of French Polynesia, etc.
      • France is home to the international cycling competition Le Tour de France.

      International rankings

      • Total GDP, 2005: 6th (out of 180) (World Bank data)
      • Total value of foreign trade (imports and exports), 2002: 4th (out of 185)
      • Reporters Without Borders world-wide press freedom index 2005: Rank 30 out of 167 countries

      See also

      • Europe
      • Great power
      • Latin Union
      • List of French people
      • Military history of France
      • Roman Catholicism by country
      • Scoutisme Français
      • Trente Glorieuses

      Notes and references




Additional topics

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