The Grenelle: a chance for environment or a swindle?

In October 2007, the 'Grenelle de l'Environnement' brought together five bodies: environmental non-governmental organizations, labor syndicates, the Movement of French Enterprises (MEDEF), the French government and the French autonomous regions. The author makes a status, measure by measure, of the 8 main topics: settlement and town planning, health and environment, sustainable agriculture, biodiversity preservation, renewable energies development, sustainable transports, improvement of wastes management, and building up of an ecological democracy. In all, 273 commitments were undertaken which is enormous. The first aim of this book is to explain in an accessible way the formulated measures and what would change in our everyday life in the future. But how about the fulfillment of these commitments, a year after their undertaking? Will they be honored or not? Each chapter comprises an abstracts of the decisions taken, a comment made by specialists of each domain and a brief activity report after the first year of implementation. (J.S.)