Is France still deindustrialising?

In 1981, industry accounted for 20.7% of the value added produced in France; in 2025, 12.0%. In between, the share lost more than two fifths of its starting level, according to the national accounts of the Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (INSEE). The word deindustrialisation first refers to this relative decline.

But a relative decline is not an absolute one, and the series carries a break in 2023 that lifts the share from 10.8% to 13.2% without a single factory reopening. This page's question is therefore twofold: does France produce less industry, or only less in proportion? And what is the recent rebound worth?

Industry's share of gross domestic product (GDP) falls by 8.5 points of percentage between 1981 and 2010, then by only 1.4 points between 2010 and 2022. The bulk of relative deindustrialisation belongs to the 1980-2000 years; from 2010, the share stabilises around twelve per cent, with a low at 10.8% in 2022.

The car production index — an emblematic sector, not the whole of industry — tells a more brutal story. Based 100 in 2021, it peaks at 187.3 in 2004, drops to 112.2 in 2009, recovers to 136.6 in 2019, collapses to 96.3 in 2020 and stands at 104.9 in 2025: −44.0% relative to the 2004 peak, −23.2% relative to 2019.

The goods trade balance, as measured by the national accounts, showed a surplus of €29.9bn in 1997. It turns into a deficit from 2004, digs a first hole at €−60.3bn in 2011, then a chasm at €−131.8bn in 2022 under the effect of energy prices, before returning to €−53.7bn in 2025.

The 2023 break deserves to be explained before being interpreted. The national accounts' “industry” aggregate combines manufacturing with the energy, water and extractive branch. In 2023, the value added of that second branch jumped in value with electricity prices, which lifts the share of the whole by 2.3 points in one year — then brings it back to 12.5% in 2024 and 12.0% in 2025 as prices normalise. The series is served without splicing, and this page says so: the 2023 jump is not reindustrialisation.

What has really changed since 2010 is the pace: the share has fallen by barely a point and a half in twelve years, against eight and a half points over the three previous decades. If relative deindustrialisation continues, it does so far more slowly.

The exchange rate does not explain the path. The euro was worth 0.90 dollars in 2001 and 1.47 in 2008, its peak: industry was then losing ground with an expensive currency. But it was worth 1.11 in 2015 and 1.05 in 2022, far lower, without industry's share recovering (12.3% in 2015, 10.8% in 2022). A cheaper currency helps exporters; it did not reverse the trend.

The goods balance and industry's share deteriorated together between 2000 and 2011, which is consistent: a country that produces fewer goods imports more. But the balance also depends on the price of imported energy — 2022 shows this in the extreme, with a deficit that doubles in a year without industry changing size.

Three dates. The year 2004, when the goods balance tips durably into deficit after a decade of surpluses, as the euro strengthens and China fully enters world trade. The year 2009, when car production loses more than a quarter of its level in one year and will not recover it. And 2022, when the price of imported energy makes the goods balance the worst of the series, which opens in 1975, before a partial recovery.

The 2023 break in industry's share is a statistical event, not an economic one: it measures the surge in energy value added, not a return of factories.

In 2025, industry's share is 12.0%, car production stands at 104.9 (2021 = 100), the goods balance at €−53.7bn. None of the three series signals reindustrialisation; none signals an acceleration of the decline either.