Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur


Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur is one of the eighteen administrative regions of France, the far southeastern on the mainland. Its prefecture is Marseille. The region is roughly coterminous with the former French province of Provence, with the addition of the following adjacent areas: the former papal territory of Avignon, known as Comtat Venaissin; the former Sardinian-Piedmontese county of Nice, whose coastline is known in English as the French Riviera and in French as the Côte d'Azur; and the southeastern part of the former French province of Dauphiné, in the French Alps. Previously known by the acronym PACA, the region adopted the name Région Sud as a commercial name or nickname in December 2017. 5,007,977 people live in the region according to the 2015 census.
It encompasses six departments in Southeastern France: Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Alpes-Maritimes, Bouches-du-Rhône, Hautes-Alpes, Var and Vaucluse. It is bounded to the east by the France-Italy border, to the south by the Mediterranean Sea and by the Principality of Monaco, to the north by Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, and to the west by Occitanie, with the Rhône river marking its westernmost border. The region logotype displays the coat of arms created in the 1990s and which combines the coats of arms of the old provinces making up Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. The region's economy is the third largest in France, just behind Île-de-France and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Its GDP in 2012 was €142.4 billion while its per capita GDP was €28,861.

Demographics

Population

According to a 2015 census, the population in the region was 5,007,977; Marseille and its metropolitan area is the most populous in the region with a city population of 850,636, an urban population of 1,560,921 and a metropolitan population of 1,720,941. Marseille is the second largest city in France after Paris, and has the third largest metropolitan population, behind those of Paris and Lyon respectively.
Nice is host to the second-largest population concentration in the region, with a city population of 344,875 and an urban population of 1,005,230, making it the fifth-most populous city in France.

Languages

The absolute majority of the population speaks French and there are many minority languages. According to the 1999 Census, 4.39% spoke English and 2.63% spoke Italian with their relatives, friends or peers. Other minority languages were Spanish, Arabic, Provençal and Corsican.

Immigration

According to a 2009 study, nearly 40% of all newborns in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur in 2007 had at least one parent of an immigrant background, mostly Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Maghrebi. This is the second-highest rate after Île-de-France, where the figure was around 56%. Since the 1960s, the region has been a major immigration centre into France, mostly due to Mediterranean immigration from countries such as Portugal, Spain, Italy, Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco.

Departments

Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur is divided into 6 departments. These are Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Hautes-Alpes, Alpes-Maritimes, Bouches-du-Rhône, Var and Vaucluse.

Major cities

The largest cities in the region are Marseille, Nice, Toulon, and Aix-en-Provence, each with a population exceeding 100,000 inhabitants at the 1999 census. Along with Marseille, Nice is the second most populous city in the region with a city proper population of about 350,000 and an urban population exceeding 1 million.
Marseille, with an urban area of 2 million inhabitants, is the largest and capital city of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. It is also the second most populated city in France, just behind Paris and the city with the third largest metropolitan population in France, behind Paris and Lyon respectively.
Along with Nice and Marseille the region is also made internationally popular with Cannes which, though not a large city, hosts the annual Cannes Film Festival which has highly popularized the region. Also, Arles has become renowned as the city in which Vincent van Gogh lived and painted 300 paintings.
Toulon is a large military harbour on the Mediterranean coast, with the French naval base placed there. It is the capital of the Var department in the region. Also, Aix-en-Provence has long been a university town, and to this day remains the most important educational centre in the region.
Below is a list of the most populated cities in the region along with their population according to the most recent census.
This region has a total area of. It has a wide variety of landscapes, from the Alps mountains to plains and coastal areas like Nice and Marseille, which form the majority of the land area. The region has a Mediterranean coastline on the south, on which the majority of its population lives. It borders Italy to the east, Monaco in the south-east, and the French regions of Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes to the north and Occitanie to the west. The Rhône, Var and Arc rivers run through the region. The borders were unaffected by the 2016 French regional reforms.
This region is famous for the Côte d'Azur, which spans the glamorous cities of Nice, Saint-Laurent-du-Var, Antibes, Juan-les-Pins, Cannes, Fréjus, Saint-Raphaël, Sainte-Maxime and Saint-Tropez.

Regional government and politics

The Regional Council of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur is the legislative body of the region. The President of the Regional Council has been Renaud Muselier since 2017.

Political tendencies

In the recent years Les Républicains have gained strong support in the region and following the 2015 departmental elections, they control the region, which had been narrowly controlled by the Parti Socialiste with Michel Vauzelle previously.
The French Communist Party historically had several strongholds in the region from the 1920s onward, including Aubagne, Draguignan, La Ciotat, Beausoleil, Martigues, Gardanne, Arles and some suburbs of Marseille. Though not enough to win the regional elections, the party usually received about 10% of the vote. Beginning with 2002 this declined to 4% and by 2012, dropped below 2%.
The main competition seen in the politics of this region is between Les Républicains and the Parti Socialiste, both deferring in its opinions. According to the most recent elections, the political tendencies are as follows-
Élection / collectivitésLes Républicains Parti Socialiste
Presidential Election 57.62% 42.38%
Regional Councils51 72
General Councils51
Deputies2715
Senators139

Economy

The regional income per capita is close to the French national average. Income inequality however is higher than in other regions: the region is ranked 4th by percent of population living above the poverty line. The region is ranked third by GDP. Between 2007 and 2011, the region registered an average annual growth rate of 1.6% of GDP, close to the national average annual growth rate of 1.5%. Representing 7.2% of the national GDP over the period, the region is an important economic powerhouse.
In 2013, the region was responsible for 7.4% of national employment, with an employment rate of 89.2%. The region's employment success has a main characteristic: a higher concentration of elderly people than in the rest of France.
With more than 80% of regional employment in the service sector in 2010, the regional economy is mostly oriented towards service activities, above the national average of 76.3%. The sector grew between 2000 and 2010. The region concentrates more on commercial activities than financial ones than the rest of France does; principally because of tourism. 34% of the labour force is employed in retail and trade, against 32% at the national level. Moreover, the sector strongly contributes to growth of added value. The industrial sector, including construction, consists of 17.1% of regional employment, and contributes to 9.3% of gross added value, 3.2 points below the French level.
Employment in the agricultural sector is lower than the national level. However, it grew at a rate of 4.1% annually on average between 2000 and 2008, while the rest of the country saw its agricultural employment decline by 2.4%. According to the Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, the region is characterised by a strong presence of SMEs of less than 500 employees, which represent 91.2% of local businesses. Retail activities and tourism explain these figures.
The region's economy is dependent on tourism like most coastal places but also a majority of its economy is dependent on coastal activities. PACA is the 3rd richest French region and ranks 19th on the European scale. Its prosperity is mainly thanks to its attractiveness in terms of tourism; it is indeed one of the world's favourite tourist destinations, welcoming about 34 million tourists every year. The service sector predominates and provides many good jobs. In 2009, the region was admittedly affected by the global economic crisis, albeit to a small extent. It is the 2nd French region with regards to business startups.
If tourism is the driving force of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, the region is also a leader when it comes to innovative sectors, such as high technology, biotechnology, and microelectronics. Education, for its part, is well developed with the region's various universities, international schools, preparatory classes for specialist university courses, and engineering and business schools. All these institutions of higher learning help contribute to the human capital needed by the region to meet current technological challenges.
The region has a total GDP of €142.4 billion, the third highest in France. It has a per capita GDP of €28,861, slightly higher than the French average. According to a recent survey, a person living in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur has an average annual income of about €37,489.
The region has been part of Alps–Mediterranean Euroregion since 10 July 2007.

Culture

The region is one of the most visited of France, and has therefore many well-known museums, mostly in Marseille: the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations, the Musée Cantini, the Musée Grobet-Labadié, the Marseille History Museum, the Musée des beaux-arts de Marseille, the Musée de la Faïence de Marseille and the Muséum d'histoire naturelle de Marseille are some of the tourist spots of the city. However, other museums are internationally recognised, like the Musée Matisse, the Musée d'art moderne et d'art contemporain, the Musée Marc Chagall, the Musée international d'Art naïf Anatole Jakovsky, the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nice, the Musée National du Sport and the Muséum d'histoire naturelle de Nice.

Transportation

Airports

PACA has two of the busiest airports in France: Nice Côte d'Azur Airport and Marseille Provence Airport. Nice saw 13,850,000 people travelling through its airport in 2018, while 8,478,541 used Marseille to fly.
Minor airports include Montpellier–Méditerranée Airport and Toulon–Hyères Airport.

Motorways

The region is at the centre of a complex and dense motorway network, in the heart of Mediterranean coast. Motorways are operated by ASF, ESCOTA, SMTC, MPM and DIR Med. In PACA, motorways have the particularity to serve the city centres of big towns, unlike other big cities of France. This is due to their comparatively early construction in relation to the motorways of France's other regions.

High speed services

The region is served by 13 high-speed trains stations and one more in the Principality of Monaco. Two stations are situated on the HSL LGV Méditerranée opened in 2001: Avignon TGV and Aix-en-Provence TGV. The others stations served by high-speed services are Avignon-Centre, Arles, Miramas, Marseille-Saint-Charles, Toulon, Les Arcs-Draguignan, Saint-Raphaël-Valescure, Cannes, Antibes, Nice-Ville and Menton.
Services operated
Services operated by SNCF Ouigo:
Services operated by SNCB/NMBS TGV:
Services operated by CFF Lyria:
Services operated by DB Alleo:
Services operated by Renfe AVE:
Services operated by Eurostar:
Services operated by Thalys :
Despite the importance of the region in the national economy and demography, the national services on conventional network are not very high due to the fact of the saturations of the tracks with high speed and regional trains.
Services operated by SNCF Intercités:
Services operated by Thello Eurocity:
All regional trains services are operated by SNCF TER Provence-Alpes Côte d'Azur, except between Nice and Digne-les-Bains, operated by CP, the own-region company. The Regional Council of Provence-Alpes Côte d'Azur is the transport authority and defines the services in all region. An attractive fare permits to transport more than 100,000 passengers every day in 750 trains. Trains are leaving every 15, 20, 30, 60 or 120 minutes on each line.
With only one big line, the tracks are saturated causing delays or cancellations. The region has to rent other trains from other regions to respond at the offer. In 2016, during the second Council of the Year at the Region Hall in Marseille, in front of politicians and the new president of the Regional Council of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Christian Estrosi, the SNCF CEO, Guillaume Pepy, has announced the impossibility of the company to respond to the demand. The Marseille-Saint-Charles Station, the Marseille's main railway station can't support more than 23 trains an hour and the tracks are too old and not enough to accept an average of the capacity. The project of new high-speed line called LGV PACA in 2030 could permit to increase trains on tracks with a new crossing of Marseille with a tunnel. Two new stations will be created in the territory of the city and a new line between Cannes and Nice Côte d'Azur Airport.
Services operated by CP:
Services operated by SNCF are declined with two appellations unlike other regions : TER, normally suburban trains and Intervilles, long-distance regional trains.
Services operated by SNCF Intervilles:
Services operated by SNCF TER:
The mining company Alteo processes bauxite to produce aluminium, resulting in various waste materials such as "boues rouges" and arsenic. The dumping of this waste in the marine reserve of the Calanques National Park for 6 years was authorised by the French government in 2015. Company representatives have dismissed environmental concerns as exaggerated and uninformed. The region also includes another National Park, the Port-Cros National Park near Toulon.
Due to motor vehicle traffic, the urban areas are often saturated on a daily basis, but cities are investing in public transport networks such as Marseille's subway and tramway, Aubagne tramway and Nice tramway. Other networks existed at the beginning of the 20th century in smaller cities such as Aix-en-Provence, Avignon, La Ciotat and Toulon but are now gone.

Education

Major universities of the region include the Aix-Marseille University, the University of Toulon, the University of Avignon and the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis. Other towns have higher education classes but no universities.