Paris – In front of a handful of delegates gathered in a workshop, François Legault proposed on Saturday that the International Organization of La Francophonie negotiate with the major digital platforms to force them to include up to 30% French-speaking content.
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The Prime Minister spoke during a round table on the theme “Create, innovate and undertake in French for youth employment”, as part of the Francophonie summit, which ends today in Paris.
Representatives from France, Morocco, Monaco, Rwanda and Romania were present, as well as two young guests from Wallonia, Belgium, and Armenia.
“I would like to see the OIF get involved in negotiations with the large digital companies to demand, in fact, two things,” he told the group in front of him.
Firstly, Quebec wants the Francophonie to require the Netflix, Amazon and Spotify of this world to include a certain percentage of content in French.
François Legault mentioned the figure of 30%.
Presentation of contents
At the same time, the CAQ Prime Minister wants to force digital giants to make French-speaking productions more visible on their platforms, i.e. the concept of “discoverability”.
“I would like all the countries of the Francophonie to come together, that we give a mandate to the OIF to meet with the managers of the major digital platforms to demand that there be a certain cultural diversity,” declared François Legault, inviting the members of the workshop to share their comments with him.
The question of discoverability is one of the themes put forward by the OIF in recent years, but also a concern of the Legault government for several months.
An advisory committee mandated by Quebec to explore this issue recommended, last January, the creation of international alliances.
“Quebec cannot lead this fight for discoverability alone,” its authors wrote, adding that the government “must build alliances.”
“The actions he takes must find an extension in an international diplomatic strategy. Affirming the cultural sovereignty of States over large transnational digital platforms requires solidarity and consultation,” explained the committee which brought together Louise Beaudoin, Clément Duhaime, Véronique Guèvremont and Patrick Taillon.
Integration
For example, the authors noted that, according to a study by the Institute of Statistics of Quebec, local artists represented only 8% of listening in the province on streaming music services in 2022.
Rather during his Paris mission, François Legault also argued that the omnipresence of English on digital platforms harms the integration of newcomers.
“Digital… there is an attraction. If we tell newcomers, you can speak whatever language you want, in North America, it’s tempting to say: I’m going to go to the Internet, I’m going to go to Netflix, I’m going to go to Spotify, and for the rest of my life will happen in English,” he illustrated in an interview on TV5 Monde.
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