A decree that came into force on April 1st, 2025 changes the criteria for reasonable job offers (ORE) for cross-border workers in France. From now on, they will have to accept a job offer based on salaries in France, rather than those in their previous country of employment.
Find the description of each pilot action in our thumbnails!
The 19th session of the Franco-Swiss border dialogue was held on March 13th in Lausanne at the International Institute for Management Development. This event, which brings together national and local administrations from the border area on an annual basis, provided an opportunity to take stock of the main cross-border cooperation issues.
On December 20th, 2024, after more than ten years of negotiations, the European Union and Switzerland concluded a set of agreements aimed at strengthening their bilateral relations. These agreements, which have yet to be approved by the Swiss parliament, will have repercussions for Franco-Swiss cross-border cooperation and freedom of movement. Relations between the EU and Switzerland are governed by more than 120 bilateral agreements.
Since March 2023, the Commission for the planning, development and protection of the Jura mountains (Massif du Jura) and the MOT have been working on a cross-border territorial study of the Franco-Swiss massif.
In France, resigning minister Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet announced on December 3rd, 2024 that the controversial reform of border worker unemployment would be abandoned. This measure, which would have reduced benefits for border workers, was met with strong opposition, particularly in eastern France.
In 2021, border workers travel an average of 34 km to get to work, compared with 14 km for non-border workers living in the same areas. The majority go by car. 18% of them have journeys of 50 km or more, and there are significantly more of these long journeys than in 2010.
As part of its mission to analyse and support border territories, the MOT is launching a new series of publications dedicated to cross-border monitoring. This first issue is devoted to a key topic: the dynamics of the economy and employment in cross-border contexts, and more specifically the flows of cross-border workers on the French borders. In French only.
At the beginning of October, the French government relaunched negotiations on the unemployment insurance agreement, handing over the reins to the social partners and calling for ‘additional savings of 400 million euros from next year’, while suggesting that the issue of cross-border workers, who ‘receive much higher salaries in certain neighbouring countries, particularly Switzerland and Luxembourg’, should be examined.
On October 18th, 2024, a Franco-Swiss symposium on human resources in the health sector was held, organised by the French Ministry of Health and Access to Care and the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH). The aim was to bring together representatives of healthcare professionals and administrations, as well as members of parliament and local councillors from areas on the Franco-Swiss border.
A study on the ‘border effect’ around Switzerland, conducted by the Geneva-based FEDRE (Foundation for the Economy and Sustainable Development of the Regions of Europe), sets out ten very concrete proposals in areas such as taxation, culture, health and mobility.
Each year, the compensation system for cross-border workers represents an additional cost of around 800 M€ for the French unemployment insurance scheme. Following the publication of its report, the Unédic, that manages French unemployment insurance, is calling for a renegotiation of agreements with neighboring countries.
The Swiss Federal Council adopted its new spatial planning strategy on June 26th, 2024. It aims to strengthen the various functional areas of the country (conurbations, rural and mountain areas) and runs until 2031. How does this strategy take border areas into account? Could France learn from it?
On October 1st, the Collectivité européenne d'Alsace (European Territorial Authority of Alsace) held its 4th partnership meeting in Strasbourg, devoted to the Schéma alsacien de coopération transfrontalière (Alsace cross-border cooperation scheme).
The 2024 edition of the Saint-Dié International Geography Festival (FIG), the annual meeting place for French-speaking geographers, will focus on border issues. In addition to this year's theme, ‘Lands’, an opportunity to explore the challenge of ZAN (Net Zero Artificialisation) and its implications, the guest territory for the 2024 edition was a macro-regional area familiar to the MOT network: the Alpine Arc.
The creation of a new online platform, called StatRhena, was announced by the Upper Rhine Interreg program following its monitoring committee meeting on July 9th, 2024.
In a meeting in Nyon on July 2nd, 2024, the Assembly of the Local cross-border cooperation group (GLCT) of Greater Geneva laid the foundations for its “Cross-border territorial vision for 2050”.
For over a year, the MOT has been conducting an experiment on “cross-border living areas”, supported by seventeen partners in five pilot sites. You can now consult the final report and download our infographic of the study's key takeaways. Don't forget to register for our webinar on June 5th!
The report entitled "Les nouveaux enjeux de développement des territoires de montagne : Pour une montagne vivante en 2030" ("New development challenges for mountain regions: For a living mountain in 2030") by Joël Giraud, Member of Parliament for the Hautes-Alpes, has just been published.
A first-of-its-kind partnership in Europe, "3Land" imagines the shared future of a cross-border district on the Dreiländereck, on the French-German-Swiss border. Discover our new project sheet!
On March 19th, 2024, the Government of the Republic and Canton of Jura and the European Collectivity of Alsace signed a new roadmap. The aim is to redefine the areas of cooperation between the two neighbours for the years 2024 and 2025.
Law 2016-41 of 26 January 2016 on the modernisation of France's healthcare system introduced a new "Regional Health Project" (PRS), maintained in principle, with three new components: a 10-year Strategic Orientation Framework (COS), a single 5-year Regional Health Scheme (SRS) and a Regional Programme on Access to Prevention and Care for the Most Deprived (PRAPS).
For almost a year, the MOT, supported by sixteen partners, has been conducting a "cross-border living areas" experiment on five pilot sites on the French borders: PAMINA Eurodistrict (French-German border), the Lille-Kortrijk-Tournai Eurometropolis (French-Belgian border), Nord Lorrain - Luxembourg (French-Luxembourg border), Southern Alps - Riviera (French-Italian-Monegasque border) and Franco-Vaud-Geneva conurbation (French-Swiss border)
The new allowance designed to protect the purchasing power of civil servants in the Franco-Swiss cross-border area, announced on September 28th, 2023 by Stanislas Guerini, the French Minister for Transformation and the Civil Service, was extended on December 12th to 133 municipalities, instead of the 61 initially announced.
The 2023-2027 State-Region Plan Contract (CPER) for the Grand Est region provides for more than €2.1 billion in funding for its mobility component.
