France’s environmental policy is proactive and ambitious, as exemplified in 2015 by the passage of the Energy Transition for Green Growth Act and the adoption of the Paris Agreement by the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP21). The OECD has worked tirelessly to support this agreement and will continue to back international efforts to fight climate change. Against a domestic backdrop of low economic growth over the last decade, France has made progress in decoupling by reducing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) and the main atmospheric pollutants, curtailing freshwater abstraction and stabilising the generation of municipal waste. Nevertheless, intensive farming, urbanisation, land take and expanding transport infrastructure continue to have a negative impact on water and air pollution and on ecosystems. It is therefore vital to develop green activities to underpin growth while maintaining a focus on environmental protection and the sustainable management of natural resources.