Podcast: French restaurants turn to takeaway, police-bashing, climate history

The Covid-19 lockdowns in France have drastically affected restaurants, forcing some to reinvent themselves to stay afloat. As mistrust in the police grows following recent cases of police brutality, an officer talks about dealing with police-bashing. And five years after the Paris climate accord, France, like most countries, is still not living up to its promises. 

Spotlight on France episode 44 © RFI

Takeaway wasn’t a major part of French eating culture, but when Covid-19 lockdowns forced restaurants and cafes to close for several months this year, some owners started experimenting. Victor Mercier opened his restaurant FIEF in October 2019 and has only been able to welcome diners for six months. The lockdowns have been catastrophic for him and for the industry in general. While waiting for restrictions to ease, he's been testing the takeaway model. But how do you transpose the gastronomic dining experience into a cardboard container? Mercier got creative and called in the hot dogs. (Listen @1’08)

Anti-police sentiment is growing in France on the back of the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States, fueled by an increase in police violence, especially during demonstrations. But France’s police officers feel they’re all paying a heavy price for the failures of a minority. Some have taken to social media to shine light on their day-to-day jobs, their degrading working conditions and lack of support. Young cop Juliette Alpha (@juliettealpha17) talks about handling the wave of hatred directed towards the police and the need for more transparency when dealing with investigations into police brutality. (Listen @14’15)

Five years ago, on 12 December 2015, some 200 countries made climate history when they adopted the landmark Paris agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The aim is to keep global temperatures from rising more than 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels by 2100. But only a handful of countries have since provided their contributions and France is not one of them. (Listen @11’00)

This episode was mixed by Cécile Pompéani.

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, iTunes (link here), Google podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here), or your favourite podcast app.