Conversation Franz Fayot
“A reflection I want to lead over the next three years” Luxembourg minister Franz Fayot (LSAP) reflects on the parameters framing the country’s growth and opportunities in diverse sectors, his dual portfolio in economy and development cooperation and what he’s looking forward to during the official missions to Dubai. Interview NATALIE A. GERHARDSTEIN Photo ROMAIN GAMBA
I understand you’ll be participating in the official space mission to Dubai, among others. Could you tell us a bit about the potential you see in this sector: how important is it in terms of the diversification of Luxembourg’s economy? It’s very important because internationally, it really puts us on the map as a country of innovation, as a country that does not hesitate to make bold moves by going into the new space economy, investing quite importantly in this Space Resources initiative, where the idea is to build an ecosystem, which involves research, incubators, [and also] legislation, partnerships such as the Artemis Accords, but also partnerships with a number of other countries… where new space companies can establish and set up shop in Luxembourg and really work with each other to advance with new business models. [These] are all geared towards seeing how you can, in the first stage, really use the data that you get through Earth observation, and combine that with data sets here on Earth, and use that, for instance, for space traffic, debris management. I think these are the first applications that we see, but also Earth observation, with a range of different applications--in maritime, precision farming, also potentially in development cooperation and humanitarian fields to observe droughts, severe climate phenomenon and really make a difference also for the Earth.
I think that’s a very exciting field, and it’s one that has been started by my predecessor [Étienne Schneider], but which I’m also very keen to continue.
OFFICIAL SPACE MISSION: 8 LUXEMBOURG EXHIBITORS Franz Fayot will participate in the economic mission focused on the space sector, taking place in the UAE on 24-30 October and coinciding with the International Astronautical Congress (IAC), held for the first time ever in the Middle East. The flagship event is expected to bring in around 6,000 international participants. Eight exhibitors will be hosted by Luxembourg, with Luxembourg Space Agency’s support, including Gomspace, iSpace, List’s Erin, Maana, Offworld, Saturne Technology, SES and Spire. Source
Ministry of the economy
There has been debate over the last two years about what sort of economic sectors Luxembourg should attract-the dichotomy between industrial entities like Fage and high-tech initiatives like the Google data centre, for instance. Which sectors are most promising, in your opinion? …We had [previously] identified a number of sectors to diversify our economy, which include healthtech, cleantech--all companies involved in basically making the Earth cleaner and also building on circular economy. This also involves everything that is digital, but I would qualify digital and ICT more as an enabling sector for the rest. Space is also among them. Logistics is also a very strong field that we have--also a bit of an enabler because you see that logistics is really evolving into this supply chain management which is a very high added value form of logistics, and which has been instrumental in managing the covid-19 crisis. We have been able to draw on this strong logistics sector that we have--very high added value logistics, but also very competitive with Cargolux, with trains, very good infrastructure, such as our Euro hubs and strong digitalisation.
OCTOBER 2021 INTERNATIONAL
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