Monique Barbut had resigned earlier this week claiming the “forces opposing” her green transition agenda had become “too powerful.”
PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron asked his Minister for Ecological Transition Monique Barbut to stay in her role after she resigned on Wednesday morning.
“The French president refused her resignation,” government spokesperson Maud Bregeon announced at a press conference. “They agreed on three fundamental pillars that will guide her action: forests, water and environmental health … on which she agreed to remain fully invested.”
Barbut’s office told French news agency AFP that she had agreed to remain in her post “at the request” of the president, citing “the urgent need to take action against the consequences of climate change.”
Earlier on Wednesday, the minister announced on LinkedIn that she would step down, citing the “forces opposing” her green transition agenda becoming “too powerful” and making it impossible for her to carry out her job.
Tensions between Barbut — a former climate diplomat and former head of the French branch of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) — and the government came to a head over an agriculture bill that temporarily authorized the use of a currently banned pesticide for nut producers and doubled water storage allowances for farmers over the next decade, two provisions she had publicly opposed.
Barbut claimed Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu’s government assured her that the pesticide would not be included in the final bill, only to allow lawmakers to reinsert the provision.
“In terms of both substance and approach, this reversal represents, in my view, one environmental setback too many,” she wrote.