Sweden: innovation and democracy on the menu for the last day of Emmanuel Macron’s state visit

Far from being angry about agriculture, Emmanuel Macron continues his state visit to Sweden. After a gala dinner to which he and his wife Bridget were invited by King Carl XVI Gustaf, Sweden’s leader for fifty years, the first French president to visit Sweden since Jacques Chirac in 2000 heads to southern Sweden this Wednesday. He should focus on innovation in the face of climate and digital challenges, and discuss democracy with students.

The agricultural crisis that is rocking France, like other EU countries, was invited on Tuesday for the trip. Emmanuel Macron defended the common agricultural policy, promising to put forward specific demands from French farmers on Thursday in Brussels.

He is due to speak at a business forum with French and Swedish business leaders in the capital this Wednesday, praising growing cross-investment and the “historic level” of trade in goods and services between the two countries. 22 billion euros.

Then head to Scania, in the south of the country. In the university town of Lund, Emmanuel Macron is due to visit the European Spallation Source (ESS), a research center set to become the world’s most powerful neutron source, funded by France together with 12 other European countries.

Develop cooperation in civil nuclear energy

Always accompanied by the King of Sweden, Carl XVI Gustaf, the President of the Republic must visit Alfa Laval, whose activities, according to the Elysee Palace, are “at the heart of the ecological transition of industry.” For the French president and the Swedish leaders, it is about establishing themselves as European leaders in terms of innovation, “facing the challenge of the green and digital transition,” as those around Emmanuel Macron explained.

Finally, at Lund University he will take part in the “Studentathon”, a student exchange time, a real institution of this partner institution in Saclay, near Paris. The debate is centered on “challenges for the sustainability of European democratic societies”, less than five months before European elections in which the far right could make significant progress.