Idélux

5 january 2009 at 11:13 | |

The Province of Luxembourg looks to the future

The province of Luxembourg is both the vastest and least populated region in Belgium with 260,000 inhabitants spread out over an area of 4,400 km2. To accompany the province’s economic growth, the development agency Idelux was created.

Photo : D.R.

Georges Cottin is Deputy Managing Director of the development agency Idelux, an inter-municipal body for the development of Luxembourg.

Commerce International: In what circumstances was the economic development agency Idelux founded?
Georges Cottin: “The creation of Idelux dates back to 1962. At that time, the aim was to draw together all of Luxembourg’s living forces around an economic development plan in order to deal with the issue of economic development in a rural environment. Idelux was created by public partners, namely the Province of Luxembourg and its 44 municipalities, private partners, including the bank Dexia and the insurance company Ethias, and social partners, including employer and employee unions.”

What is the official status of Idelux?
G. C.: “Idelux is a mixed development agency, that is, semi-public and semi-private. It is one of the very rare inter-municipal bodies to run without public servants or operational subsidies. Idelux currently employs 450 persons and in 2007, achieved a consolidated turnover of around 75 million euros. Its activity is divided between economic development, solid waste disposal and liquid waste disposal.”

You seem very attached to the mixed character of Idelux. Why?
G. C.: “In the area of economic development, we have largely privileged the PPP (Public Partnership-Private) method. It is a key to our success. It simultaneously allows us to have a ‘lever effect’, to share risks, to seek the best partners in each sector. Our role, ultimately, is not to replace the private sector but to play on public-private complementariness in order to offer citizens a maximum of advantages. It is to promote our new partnerships that we have been present each March, for the last five years, at the Mipim real-estate trade show in Cannes, so as to offer new projects to private economic operators.”

In your different management contracts, you have targeted five sectors of activity in Luxembourg’s economic development: logistics, the space industry, the agro-alimentary industry, wood and tourism. Why these five sectors in particular?
G. C.: “We wanted to back sectors where not only do we have the best assets for succeeding, but which also represent a strong potential for economic development. In the case of logistics, bear in mind that our province is situated at the heart of Europe: from Luxembourg, trucks have access to 58 million consumers with a strong purchasing power, in the space of four-and-a-half hours and with free flowing traffic from Strasbourg to Calais and from Paris to Rotterdam. In this sector, we also benefit from quality manpower and have created, in conjunction with the E25 and E411 highways near Neufchâteau, a business park dedicated to logistics. This park, called Ardenne Logistics, stretches out over almost 85 hectares and includes 300,000 m2 in building space. Ardenne Logistics is termed a ‘new generation’ business park as it has direct access to highways and railways and offers strong environmental integration as well as complete on-site security thanks to its infrastructures and intelligent cameras linked to a police station. On top of this, the park will offer numerous services: a training centre, an automobile mechanic, a petrol station, truck servicing, catering, a crèche… Ardenne Logistics has been established in partnership with three local constructors: Houyoux, Socogetra and Thomas & Piron. To date, the construction of a first building of almost 22,000 m2 has been recently completed, and it has already been entirely rented by logisticians. The construction of a second building will commence in spring 2009. Moreover, Luxembourg also disposes of the Athus container terminal, the number one dry port in Belgium, which processes some 80,000 containers per year. This terminal benefits from a daily rail connection with Antwerp, Bruges and Rotterdam, and should increase its processing capacity to 150,000 containers per year in the next three to four years.”

What investments have you made in the space sector?
G. C.: “Idelux has developed a business park specialised in three domains of spatial application: Galileo, GMES (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) and telecommunications. This park, called Galaxia, is located in Redu, found on
the E411 highway between Brussels and Luxembourg, near the Eurospace Centre (100% subsidiary of Idelux) and the ESA (European Spatial Agency) station. It was inaugurated on 9 December. On this park, we have created, in partnership with WSL (Wallonia Space Logistics), a 2,000 m2 business centre to host companies active in this domain. It offers the unique feature of integrating the first photovoltaic park in the Walloon region with 4,400 m2 in photovoltaic panels. Large industrial groups as well as SMEs have already set up here: VitroCiset, SES Astra, M3 System… Galaxia will soon be linked by optic fibre to the ESA station 7 kilometres way, and the transfer of data between the two will be free. What we are trying to do is to offer ‘spin outs’ and ‘spin offs’ technological accompaniment to accomplish their projects as well as financing possibilities.”

What can be said about the three other sectors you are backing, namely the agro-alimentary industry, wood and tourism?
G. C.: “The agro-alimentary industry is a historic sector in Luxembourg: 50% of our territory is made up of fields and meadows. This province is notably reputed for its cows: this is why Idelux has developed, in conjunction with the Verbist group, a meat evaluation centre with an abattoir, a carving room and an emphasis on prepared products. We wish to make this into a national jewel. The wood sector is just as historic as forests once covered 47% of the surface of the province. Moreover, companies such as Fryutier in Marche-en-Femenne and IBV in Vielsalm are ranked amongst the top 10 European companies in wood sawing. In coming months, we are going to develop in Gouvy an activity zone of around 100 hectares, linked by rail and benefiting from facilities and infrastructures specially dedicated to the wood industry. Finally, tourism is very important in Luxembourg, which is the top province in the Walloon region in terms of overnight stays (around 2.2 million per year). Our work in the coming years will consist in improving and renewing tourist offers by creating new tourism infrastructures in partnership with the provincial government of Luxembourg.”

What other economic sectors are you following closely?
G. C.: “Idelux actively participates in municipal activities in real-estate projects for infrastructures, public (sports facilities, for example) or private. One year ago, one of our projects was to rehabilitate the Espace Didier, a district at the centre of Arlon. This renovation cost approximately 35 million euros and had an impact not only on housing but also offices, shops, cinemas… We are also working on ‘eco-district’ projects in Tintigny (which will benefit 200 housing units) and Habay. All these projects share the characteristic of being developed by the PPP method.”

Propos recueillis par Inteviewed by Alexandre T. Analis