Endangered Villages

France is largely rural, with over 80% of all its municipalities being home to fewer than 2,000 inhabitants each. As a whole, these individuals account for 26% of the French population. Yet, a lot of these villages could easily become extinct, and at any given time many are struggling to keep their population at a level that will enable them to retain their basic services …or perhaps it is the other way around: villages are trying to retain their basic services so that they can keep the population they have. Regardless, a lot of hard work goes into remaining a functioning, yet traditional French village: when the one and only bakery is about to close, or the village’s school is at risk of losing one of its two teachers for lack of a sufficient school age population, it takes swift action to make these threats not become reality.

Over the years, I have witnessed many such calls to action; some of them in the village of 600 people where I spend several months a year, but others through articles in the French press, hearsay, ads put in social media or official announcements by the villages themselves or French regional governments.

Oftentimes, these calls to action simply seek to entice more people to come live in a specific village. They can also be professional in nature, seeking an individual willing and able to create or take over a business, or, on a more abstract level, might consist of calls for ideas of what might be done to promote or sustain rural areas on a larger scale. These calls are not specifically written for foreigners, yet my experience is that foreigners are usually welcome in these communities, provided they come in numbers small enough and with a willingness to fit into the village’s life.

My goal is to make practical, easy-to-use information more readily available to Anglophones who feel drawn to life in a French village, but are unsure as to where to start, or how to make it work practically or professionally.

So, what am I doing and how can you use it?

First, I have come up with a list of General Resources meant to assist those interested in life in a French village, or generally speaking in a French rural area (Note that I will be using these terms pretty much interchangeably). These resources are all in French, as they are not intended for foreigners per se, but I am assuming that a fair percentage of my readers will be somewhat proficient in French.

The next section of this document, Trends, Needs, Warnings and Other Remarks consists of a long list of remarks, part cautionary tale and encouragement and everything in between, most of which stemming from my own experience or research; or assistance of individuals wanting to move to a French rural area. I will update this section as needed once in a while.

Finally, for the third section What Local Governments Are Doing and How to Go Further I will draw from the previous section and show how specific municipalities – or groups of municipalities or regions in some rare cases – implement some of the concepts covered in Trends, Needs, Warnings and Other Remarks.  Some of this information will be taken directly from selected municipalities’ website; and some of it might even be in the form of an official call for project proposals for which the selected business will ultimately receive grant money. For the most part, however, the information conveyed will simply describe actions undertaken by a municipality to promote an activity or attract individuals who might contribute to the village’s development.   Note that in instances when the information came in the form of an official call for proposals, you may still just use it for informational purposes only, since officially responding to the call for project proposals might require burdensome legal and administrative steps. You could simply use these as an indication of what is going on in a village, or as a way to assess how well your professional project might be received. You could also use the information as a source of inspiration for what could be done in another village.

I will organize the section by themes and summarize the information I select and where appropriate, will add my own comments and suggestions on how to take the concept one step further.   It will take a while for this endeavor to reach a critical mass. I appreciate your patience, particularly if you are viewing this page at or near its inception (August 2014) and invite you to come back later.

Please understand that I cannot verify the accuracy of the information I am posting.

Feel free to contact me if you have a quick question about some of the information posted on this page. Please note that any move to France will involve immigration issues.

I hope that this page will inspire you and help sensitize you to the fragility of rural life in France and elsewhere. Thank you for your visit!

© Laurence Raybois Consulting