Topic: Macron Tries to Get France to Work
The sign on the window of Red Rhino, a popular barbecue restaurant in central Paris, has been up for a month: “Closed until further notice due to lack of personnel.” Bus and train service has been cut back in the tourist city of Lyon amid a dearth of drivers. In the Loire Valley, tons of vegetables went unharvested in the summer as thousands of picking jobs were left unfilled.
法國巴黎市中心一家人氣燒烤店「紅犀牛」櫥窗招牌已立了一個月：「人手不足，暫停營業至另行通知」。因司機不足，東南部觀光城市里昂的客運和鐵路已減班。在西部羅亞爾河谷，由於數千個採菜工作懸缺，去年夏季有成噸蔬菜無人採收。
Economic activity has fitfully revved up again in France and across Europe since the end of COVID-19 lockdowns, only to be knocked back by the effects of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Even so, employers in numerous industries remain desperate to hire, with a range of businesses still not finding the workers needed to operate at capacity.
新冠疫情防疫封鎖結束以來，法國乃至全歐洲的經濟活動已陸續再次活絡，孰料又遭俄烏戰爭效應擊退。儘管如此，諸多產業的雇主依然需人孔急，一些企業仍未覓得產能全開所需的勞工。
All of which has prompted France, Europe’s second-largest economy, to seek a variety of solutions — all of them politically combustible.
這些狀況已促使歐洲第二大經濟體法國尋求各種解決之道，而這些解方都會引爆政治爭議。
President Emmanuel Macron’s government is proposing a fast-track legalization for migrants in the country illegally who want to work in sectors facing staff shortages.
總統馬克宏領導的政府提議，非法居留法國的移民若願意在面臨缺工行業上班，就可快速合法化。
For added measure, the government is moving to tighten France’s famously generous unemployment system, with its lengthy benefits, in a bid to cycle jobless people more quickly back into the workforce.
馬克宏政府還採額外措施，收緊以長期給付而慷慨聞名的法國失業制度，設法加快失業者重回職場的周期。
The plans have met with resistance from different ends of the political spectrum. Lawmakers from France’s rising far right say a growing influx of migrants must be brought under tighter control and that French nationals should be given priority for jobs. The country’s powerful labor unions are warning that measures to cut jobless benefits risk pushing the unemployed toward poverty.
相關改革計畫已招致法國政治光譜兩端的反對。法國崛起的極右派國會議員指稱，愈來愈多移民湧入，必須更嚴格控制，法國國民應享有優先工作權。法國強勢的工會正警告，削減失業給付恐將失業者推向貧困。
For thousands of businesses that form the backbone of the economy, the double-barreled approach has become necessary to help fix to what appears to be a permanent shift in workplace dynamics since the pandemic, as European workers in droves switch jobs or decide not to return to strenuous work that demands early or late hours on relatively low pay. Over half a million people in France resigned in the first three months of the year, the highest level in 15 years, France’s statistics agency reported.
對形成法國經濟骨幹的數以千計企業而言，前述雙管齊下方法已不可或缺，才能有助化解新冠疫情以來職場動態似乎出現的永久性轉變，也就是歐洲大批勞工換工作，或決定不回到相對低薪還要求一早或很晚上班的勞累工作。法國統計局通報，2022年第一季全法有50多萬人辭職，創15年來新高。
“Our society after the pandemic has a different outlook,” said Thierry Marx, a Michelin-starred French chef who is the president of UMIH, France’s influential trade association of restaurants and hotels. “People are saying, I don’t want to have a sacrificial relationship to work.”
法國頗具影響力的餐廳與旅館同業公會「旅館餐飲職業產業聯盟」主席、法籍「米其林」星級主廚馬克斯說，「疫情之後我們社會出現一個不同的觀點，如今人們會說，我不想為工作犧牲奉獻」。Source article: https://udn.com/news/story/6904/6909797
Topic: Wanted in France: Thousands of Workers as Hotels and Restaurants Reopen
For six months, Christophe Thiriet has waited for France’s grinding national lockdowns to be lifted so he can reopen his company’s restaurants and hotels in a picturesque corner of eastern France and recall the 150 employees who were furloughed months ago.
六個月來，克里斯多弗．提希耶一直等待折磨人的法國全國封城解除，好讓公司設在如詩如畫的法國東部的餐廳和飯店能重新開張，並召回數個月前放無薪假的一百五十位員工。
But when he asked them to return for a reopening in mid-May, he faced an unexpected headache: At least 30 said they wouldn’t be coming back, leaving him scrambling to hire new workers just as he needed to swing into action.
但是當他要求他們於五月中旬重新開業時復職，卻面臨意料之外的頭痛狀況：至少三十人說他們不會回來，讓他在需要積極展開行動之際急著雇請新員工。
“When you close things for so long, people think twice about whether they want to stay,” said Thiriet, a co-manager of the Heintz Group.
「當你關店太久，人們會三思是否要留下。」海因茲集團共同經理人提希耶說。
Restaurants and hotels across the country are facing the same problem. After months on furlough, workers in droves are deciding not to return to jobs in the hospitality industry.
全國各地的餐廳和飯店正面臨相同問題。在數個月的無薪假後，成群的勞工決定不返回在餐旅業的工作。
A shortfall of perhaps as many as 100,000 restaurant and hotel workers is especially troubling, because hundreds of thousands of people are looking for work after France’s worst recession in decades. Employers say it is becoming harder to lure job seekers to an industry whose future is more or less tethered to the vagaries of the coronavirus and the uncertainty of vaccine campaigns.
餐廳和飯店工作者的短缺可能多達十萬人，這一點格外令人憂慮，因為在法國經歷數十年來最嚴重的經濟衰退後，此際有數十萬人正在找工作。雇主說，這個產業未來或多或少受制於新冠病毒的變化莫測，以及疫苗推廣的不確定性，要吸引求職者變得更困難。
The missing manpower conundrum has emerged as thousands of hotels and restaurants that survived the crisis pivot toward trying to make up for an 80% plunge in business since last spring. The COVID-19 lockdowns have cost France’s tourism industry, a cornerstone of the economy, more than 60 billion euros in lost revenue since last year.
正當數千家飯店餐廳熬過危機存活下來，力圖補回自去年春季以來暴跌百分之八十的業績之際，人力流失的難題卻浮現了。新冠病毒封城已讓作為法國經濟一大基石的旅遊產業付出巨大代價，自去年以來營收損失超過六百億歐元。
“We know we’re going to have customers again this summer — that’s not the problem,” said Yann France, the owner of La Flambée, a restaurant in the popular northern seaside city of Deauville. “The concern is that we won’t have an adequate workforce at a time when we need to make up for a huge loss in sales.”
「我們知道今年夏天我們會再度有顧客上門，這不是問題。」北方熱點海濱城市多維爾「火焰餐廳」的老闆揚恩．方瑟說，「重點是，當我們需要在銷售上彌補巨大損失的時刻，卻沒有足夠人力。」
Some say the problem may not be so stark, since international visitors aren’t yet flocking back to France, and job seekers, including students who need work to help make ends meet, could eventually fill any shortfall.
有些人說這問題也許沒那麼嚴重，因為國際遊客還沒大舉回流到法國，而包括需要打工賺錢的學生在內的求職者，最終會補足所有缺口。
But others say the precariousness of the businesses is the broader question.
不過也有人說，這行業前途不穩靠才是更大的問題。
“The bigger issue is the uncertainty over the industry’s future,” said Thierry Gregoire, the owner of NT Hotel Gallery group, which owns five hotels and three restaurants around Toulouse. “Will things stay open, or could there be another shutdown because of a new virus?”
「更大的問題是這個產業未來的不確定性。」在土魯斯擁有五間飯店和三間餐廳的NT Hotel Gallery集團老闆泰希．葛黑卦說，「開放狀態能否就此維持，或是又有隨新病毒而來的另一次封城？」Source article: https://udn.com/news/story/6904/5460885
Topic: France bans plastic packaging for fruit and veg
A law banning plastic packaging for large numbers of fruits and vegetables has come into force in France as of New Year’s Day, to end what the government has called the “aberration” of overwrapped carrots, apples and bananas, as environmental campaigners and exasperated shoppers urged other countries to do the same.
法國一項於元旦生效的法律，禁止多種水果及蔬菜以塑膠包裝，讓政府所說的胡蘿蔔、蘋果與香蕉過度包裝的「脫軌現象」畫下句點。環保人士與惱怒的顧客也敦促其他國家採取同樣的措施。
Emmanuel Macron has called the ban on plastic packaging of fresh produce “a real revolution” and said France was taking the lead globally with its law to gradually phase out all single-use plastics by 2040.
法國總統艾曼紐‧馬克宏將生鮮蔬果的塑膠包裝禁令稱為「一場真正的革命」，他說法國領先全球制定了法律，要在二○四○年前逐步淘汰所有的一次性塑膠。
Spain will introduce a ban on plastic packaging of fruit and vegetables from 2023. For years, international campaigners have said unnecessary plastic packaging is causing environmental damage and pollution at sea.
西班牙將從二○二三年起，禁止使用塑膠包裝水果及蔬菜。國際倡議人士多年來不斷表示，不必要的塑膠包裝正造成環境破壞及海洋污染。
From New Year’s Day, France bans supermarkets and other shops from selling cucumbers wrapped in plastic, and peppers, courgettes, aubergines and leeks in plastic packaging. A total of 30 types of fruit and vegetables are banned from having any plastic wrapping, including bananas, pears, lemons, oranges and kiwis.
法國自元旦起禁止超市等商店銷售以塑膠包裹的黃瓜，以及用塑膠包裝的甜椒、櫛瓜、茄子與韭蔥。禁止使用任何塑膠包裝的共有三十種水果及蔬菜，包括香蕉、梨子、檸檬、柳橙與奇異果。
Packs over 1.5kg are exempt, as well as chopped or processed fruit. Some varieties, including cherry tomatoes or soft fruits such as raspberries and blueberries, are given longer for producers to find alternatives to plastic, but plastic packaging will be gradually phased out for all whole fruits and vegetables by 2026.
一點五公斤裝以上的蔬果，以及切成小塊或加工過的水果，則不受此限塑令規範。一些品種，包括櫻桃番茄，或是軟水果例如覆盆子及藍莓，其生產商可有較多的時間尋找塑膠替代品，但到了二○二六年，所有水果及蔬菜的塑膠包裝都將逐步淘汰。
With an estimated 37 percent of fruit and vegetables sold wrapped in plastic packaging in France in 2021, the government believes the ban will cut more than 1bn items of single-use plastic packaging a year. The environment ministry said there must be curbs on the “outrageous amount of single-use plastic in our daily lives.”
二○二一年在法國販售的水果及蔬菜，有百分之三十七是以塑膠包裝；法國政府據此估計，此禁塑令每年將減少十億件以上的一次性塑膠包裝。法國環境部表示，「我們日常生活中對一次性塑膠毫無節制的使用」必須加以約束。
Fruit and vegetables wrapped in layers of plastic have exasperated consumers not only in France but neighboring countries. Nearly three-quarters of British people have experienced “anxiety, frustration or hopelessness” at the amount of plastic that comes with their shopping and 59 percent think supermarkets and brands are not doing enough to offer refillable, reusable or packaging-free products, according to a poll commissioned by Friends of the Earth and City to Sea in June last year.
將水果及蔬菜以塑膠層層包裹，惹惱的不只是法國人，還有鄰近國家的消費者。去年六月由環保組織「地球之友」與「城市至海」所委託進行的一項民意調查發現，近四分之三的英國人對購物時用到的塑膠數量感到「焦慮、無力或絕望」，百分之五十九的人認為超市及品牌在提供可填充、可重複使用或無包裝產品方面做得不夠。Source Article: https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/lang/archives/2022/01/11/2003771107