Driving Shared Development

Revitalizing Job Catchment Areas

The decisions we are forced to make to redeploy our operations do not lessen our sense of solidarity with and support for our long-standing host regions. This is why our policy is to support industrial reconversion and revitalization of employment areas.

A weak economy or declining output from an oil or gas field may mean we have to wind down our operations. What can we do to sustain the economic momentum we helped to initiate, safeguard jobs and even create new sources of employment? How can we help our contractors make the transition? In short, how can we leave a positive legacy in the regions that have supported our operations?
We believe the answer lies in a combination of local integration, a proactive approach and support initiatives. We work with public organizations to mitigate the consequences of our industrial redeployment.


We aim to help regions:

  • Stimulate the local business community and assist contractors and service providers with diversifying their customer portfolios and expanding into long-term alternative activities.
  • Support the transition to a new economic ecosystem based on these alternative activities.

Promoting Employability Through Support for Transportation Assistance

The local labor market near Carling, France could use a shot in the arm, and the ability to get around independently in the region is crucial to finding work. Aware of this fact, the local Total Petrochemicals France plant is making a commitment to promote mobility. It is providing €30,000 a year in financial support to the Écomobilité Lorraine inter-association, which helps people in need get their driver's license. Thanks to its support, the association provides assistance with courses and low-cost car rentals, thereby helping to make the area's jobseekers more employable.

Dunkirk, France

The Nanterre District Court ratified the project to repurpose the Flandres facility on October 22, 2010, overturning the ruling by the Douai Court of Appeal, which on June 30, 2010 had ordered Total to resume refining operations at the facility.

In its decision, the Nanterre District Court found that the information and consultation process involving employee representative organizations had been conducted properly and there was no reason to resume refining operations at the site. Total can therefore implement without further delay its plan to repurpose the facility into an industrial and technical facility with three new activities: a technical support center for refining operations, a training center for refining jobs and a logistics depot.

Hard hit by shrinking primary markets, especially in France, the Dunkirk facility posted more than €130 million in losses in 2009. In March 2010, given the poor outlook, we announced that the site would be repurposed away from refining operations. This project was ratified by the Nanterre District Court on October 22,2010. The plan was fine-tuned as part of a consensus-building process with the government and other stakeholders. The refinery will be converted into an industrial and technical facility with three new activities: a technical support center for refining operations, a training center for refining jobs and a logistics depot.

The plan is designed to secure the industrial future of the site, leverage the employees' high-end skills, preserve jobs and support contractors and the local economy.
The plan makes provisions for individual solutions and support for each employee, none of whom will be laid off. Options include taking another job on site, transferring to another Total facility and early retirement.
Total Développement Régional (TDR), a Total organization specializing in support for small businesses, is offering the benefits of its experience to social and economic stakeholders in and around Dunkirk, to perform an overall assessment of the region and look for solutions to save local jobs or even create new ones. Whether coming in the form of financial backing for starting up or acquiring businesses, export assistance, technical assistance or skills transfer, the various forms of support will underpin the industrial redeployment of the Dunkirk refinery.

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