Moves made to increase supply chain from France

A delegation led by Economic Development president Sasha Kazantseva-Miller met with various key stakeholders – including local government officials, business figures and Brittany Ferries representatives – during a visit to St Malo for the Forum Economique Breton last week.

Much of the discussion centred around the feasibility of directly importing food produce from Brittany, rather than it going via the UK, as well as the possibility of importing cheaper building materials.

Deputy Kazantseva-Miller praised the success of the forum and was hopeful changes could be seen locally within the next few months.

‘There’s very active work being done as we speak,’ she said.

Thanks to Guernsey’s flourishing partnership with Brittany Ferries, and the space there is for up to six trailers on the company's Voyager vessel, Deputy Kazantseva-Miller said the island now had the potential to increase its freight capacity materially.

While some freight transportation was already taking place, she said this was ‘quite small’, and so increasing strategic resilience in terms of supply chains, especially with food from France, was being looked into.

‘I think what actually happens right now is all of our supply chain for food goes via Portsmouth, but you have products coming from France, Spain and other parts of the world which are going through Dover and then onwards to Guernsey.

‘What we are looking to do is cut some of those longer supply chains and bring products to Guernsey via St Malo, but especially tap into that opportunity of local produce so close to us.’

A French market is set to come to Market Square next month, and Deputy Kazantseva-Miller said there was potential in future for fresh French produce to be on Guernsey supermarket shelves and even in local restaurants within 24 hours of being harvested.

‘We’re very keen to step all of that up,' she said.

‘We’ve already undertaken a number of trade delegations and workshops, so we’re very keen to build on that, especially in relation to fresh produce.

‘I’m really optimistic and hopeful that we can make that happen reasonably quickly,' said Deputy Kazantseva-Miller.

Work would be needed with local retailers to ensure they could take advantage of any opportunities, with changes possible to how they bought certain products.

She said that discussions were also under way about the potential of importing building materials at lower prices.

Positive relationships with the French construction sector were already being formed. Groupe Legende’s partnership with the Guernsey Housing Association on the former CI Tyres site in La Charroterie was one such example.

Asked whether French building staff could potentially come over to assist with construction projects, she said such moves would be dependent on existing population policies.

‘We need to make sure we do have a construction sector here who are also eager for work,' she said.