The reorganization of flows is transforming geographical spaces by redefining the layouts and hierarchies of places. Logistics combines economic processes and their political framework and now appears as a central issue in planning. Whereas research has been able to focus on technical devices or economic choices, the conference invites the participants to highlight logistics as an instrument of geographical governance and a political issue, in a global, in a macro-regional and in a metropolitan perspective.
China’s One Belt One Road (OBOR) strategy was launched in September 2013 by Xi Jinping. It is a global transports infrastructure strategy that covers both land (road and rail) and sea roads by connecting ports from Asia to Europe through Africa. With a budget of more than 1,400 billion dollars, it is one of the most important strategies on a global scale. The purpose of this article is firstly to characterize this strategy, from its foundations to the actual enactment modalities. It is then to propose an interpretation based on a Braudelian reading in terms of world economy and hegemonic posture leading to the emergence of new asian global value chains.
The positioning of States in global value chains has become a highly important competitive factor. Logistics and transportation constitute therefore an important lever for strategical action by states. In light of these issues, this article intends to report on the national logistics strategy, “France Logistique 2025”, whose roadmap was presented in March 2016. Beyond the deconstruction of its content and process, the objective here is to enrich the reflection about the strategist-state role and the missions in the definition and implementation of a policy, which cuts naturally across activity sectors and territories.
This paper tries to identify the anchoring factors for emerging bioeconomy activities in some territories, based on a reading of the logistic constraints of this sector which generates important flows upstream. It is based on an identification of location factors for industries using biomass; a comparison of the petroeconomy/bioeconomy “line” logistics flows and the analysis of three cases of companies: the first one remained anchored after having been bought; the other one quickly relocated; and the third one recently established. This leads to a proposal for the role of logistics governance that can contribute to anchor such activities facing highly international competition, dependent on raw materials price fluctuations and on uneven international regulations.