The latest four-day period of strikes at France’s ports is set to end at midnight with the national federation of port and dock workers, part of the CGT union, warning that industrial action could be repeated this weekend unless its demands are met.
The latest round of talks between the federation, the stevedoring companies and government officials, aimed at resolving a long-running dispute over early retirement provision, broke up in stalemate. No date has been set so far for the resumption of negotiations.
One apple exporter, based in Avignon, in south-east France and a member of the national apple and pear growers association, told FPJ that the sporadic strikes were continuing to have a significant impact on his company’s business.
“The repeated stoppages mean we have only three days of the week in which to get produce shipped from French ports and it’s become a circus quite frankly with export and import traffic running into each other because of the backlogs,” he said.
At the port of Marseilles, there are containers which have not moved for two to three weeks, he claimed.
“In order to ensure more reliable transit for our export shipments, we are now using other ports such as Barcelona, Genoa, Zeebrugge and Antwerp. This can add between €1,000 and €1,500 per container to transport costs but it’s what we’re having to do to honour contracts,” he explained.
