The regional branch of the Organization of European Road Transporters (OTRE), based in La Farlède, held its general meeting this Saturday at the RCT Campus in Toulon. The opportunity to bring together its eighty members from Provence – Alpes – Côté d’Azur. And above all to come back to the difficulties that the profession encounters and what it does to overcome them? Meeting with Olivier Riandée and Jean-Marc Montagnac, respectively president and secretary of OTRE, as well as Franck Satta, president of the brand new Endowment Fund.
Traffic difficulties, sluggish activity, complicated relationships with customers… You mention many problems affecting road transport. What is the main one?
Olivier Riandée: This is undoubtedly the question of traffic bans above a certain tonnage. Town halls decide on restrictions without consultation. This is the case for example in Grimaud where the crossing has been prohibited. We are therefore now obliged to make a detour via Sainte-Maxime: in terms of energy saving and pollution, it is not ideal. No more than for our profitability. We risk arriving at a situation where we put several smaller vehicles to serve these areas. A very specific difficulty in the Var.
Jean-Marc Montagnac: We are also being told about setting up some sort of redistribution “hub”. But you have to keep in mind that carriers don’t just deliver packages. Around here, for example, we have a lot of wine production or transport linked to public works.
While your activity transports more than twenty-seven tonnes of goods by French people across France, you say you are experiencing “truck bashing”…
Jean-Marc Montagnac: Many people only see the nuisance when it is the transporters who make it possible to fill the fridges!
Olivier Riandée: We are making our energy transition. With vehicles that run on gas, electricity or which consume little. Our vehicles are also less noisy… We have all worked in this direction and done everything that was asked of us. This contributed to an 8 to 10% increase in our production costs, which we are unable to pass on to our customers.
During this general meeting, you organized a debate on “the health of the manager”: is it particularly undermined in your profession?
Jean-Marc Montagnac: First of all, you should know that the business manager is criminally responsible. When you’re a road haulier, it’s real stress: imagine a 44-tonne driver who does anything! And then, of course, the economic context is gloomy, the political context doesn’t help anything… So, we wanted to take up this subject.
Olivier Riandée: In our profession, we really see people who are at their wits’ end.
OTRE is the initiative of the Transport Foundation, a first in France. What is its purpose?
Franck Satta: Indeed, it does not exist anywhere in France. This is an endowment fund, financed by OTRE members, but for the use of all carriers in the region. The objective is to support them in the various procedures that may occupy them, but also when retiring, to retrain or to support those who remain alive (drivers or families) after an accident. If this new structure is currently regional, the idea is for it to become national.
