He is also President of the Chamber of commerce of Roanne

Lucien Deveaux yesterday took the head of the Union of textile industries (ITU), in replacement of Guillaume Sarkozy, to which he will succeed also on the Board - exé

Executive of the Medef and the Vice-Presidency of the Group of the industrial federations. He is also President of the Chamber of commerce of Roanne. Aged

Sixty-five years, this figure of the French textile chairs the Supervisory Board of Deveaux SA, of which he was one of the leading European manufacturers of fabrics for ready-to-wear, with 145 million euros of turnover and 6.4 million of net income in 2005. With the distributor of clothing Armand Thiery, which he is the Director-General, and male ready-to-wear specialist Ecce, empire of Lucien Deveaux account 3,000 employees. Weakened by the filing of his company, weaving de Picardie, Guillaume Sarkozy, President of the ITU since 2000, renounces to all employer mandates.

Do you think that the French textile will still exist in 10 years, with competition from China in particular

The only way to exist in the textile is to be innovative and creative. Time of my great-

parents, people bought fabric for dress and hot. Today, we buy the fabric to seduce. If tomorrow everyone goes to buy a Logan and products "low cost", then we will have no more reason to exist. But if the standard of living continues to rise, some women will be willing to pay a 100 euros over 50 shirt a beautiful printed, a beautiful material. What percentage of the current workforce of businesses that can make live I am unable to say. Last year, the number of jobs in French textile companies, out of lingerie, certainly declined from 8 to 9 to around 100,000 people, but production has not decreased because productivity increases.

What are the priorities of your mandate

I want above all to understand the authorities that textile is today the creation of fashion industry workforce. The sinews of war is the patent for technical textiles and model, drawing, and colouring to the textile clothing, more than the improvement of a mechanical device on a loom that will save 1 productivity. Therefore, the creation receives the same treatment as the technology. However, research on the intangible tax credit is capped at 33,000 euros per year while the "hardware" research can benefit from 8 million. We have difficulty in getting this message to the Government. François Loos, Minister delegate for industry, however responded to the difficulties of textile for loans companies with banks. He announced yesterday that the guarantee of credit by Oséo-Sofaris would increase from 50 to 70.

What do you expect from Europe

What shocks me, it is as an Indian, a Brazilian or Chinese discharge of 6 to 7 of customs duties for export to Europe while a French industry pays 60, 30 or 20 when it sells its fabric to these countries. The evolution of these customs measures within Europe, as well as legislation to protect the drawings, models and patents. The France was very effective against the copy laws, but it remains to extend them to the European Union and the world.