segunda-feira, fevereiro 09, 2009

Crise Global 60

O governo popular de Barak Obama



Continuo a receber regularmente mensagens e vídeos de Barak Obama (1), agora na sua qualidade de presidente dos Estados Unidos da América. Inscrevi-me, por curiosidade, no seu sítio web, quando começou a campanha para as presidenciais. A plataforma eleitoral continua, por incrível que pareça, mais viva do que nunca!

Evoluiu entretanto para um verdadeira rede social de massas, com fortes componentes tecnológicas, de comunicação interactiva e de formação de poder a partir das bases sociológicas que elegeram o actual presidente americano. Chama-se Organizing for America.

O modelo, ainda que mais elegante e tecnológico, é aparentemente o mesmo há muito seguido, entre outros, por Fidel Castro e Hugo Chávez! Mas será mesmo?

Vamos precisar de algum tempo para avaliar o potencial desta verdadeira guarda pretoriana no extraordinário jogo de cintura que o novo presidente americano terá que evidenciar para conseguir levar por diante o seu plano. A verdade é que a situação da América é desesperada. E não vai ser nada fácil lidar com a enorme corrupção que tomou conta de Washington juntando democratas e republicanos nas mesmas práticas de tráfico de influências e subserviência aos poderosos sectores da finança e indústria da maior potência militar do planeta. O nosso Bloco Central da Corrupção não faz mais do que copiar, em pequenino, tarde e a más horas, este modelo escandalosamente gasto.

Há quem diga que Obama traz uma verdadeira revolução escondida na sua bagagem. Uma revolução pacífica, mas uma revolução mundial... dirigida ao poder desconhecido da mente.

Uma já célebre fotografia, que exibe o actual presidente americano com uma gravata MT ao peito, parece apontar para algo comum em muitos políticos americanos: a necessidade de uma forte motivação "interior". Quem não se lembra da peregrinação de Hillary Clinton a Fátima! No caso de Obama, tudo leva porém a crer que essa força interior reside na Meditação Transcendental — espécie de renascimento futurista das milenares visões védicas do mundo.

O facto de a sua campanha ter começado em Iowa, onde se situa a pequena cidade de Fairfield, sede da Maharishi University of Management e a escassos quilómetros da Maharishi Vedic City, uma cidade-modelo contemporânea desenhada segundo a sabedoria védica, mas incorporando as mais avançadas e inovadoras tecnologias de desenvolvimento sustentável, auto-organização, gestão e comunicação, prenuncia, a ser verdade, uma nova luz para entender a acção de Obama.

O facto de a MT ser tipicamente e em todo o mundo um movimento de quadros técnicos e empresariais da classe média, associado à evidência de a crise americana ser, em primeiro lugar, a maior crise de sempre da própria classe média —ameaçada de extinção pela lógica auto-destrutiva do Capitalismo— faz um especial sentido para o ângulo de visão sugerido pela visita do então candidato Barak Hussein Obama à cidade de Fairfield, onde posou para a fotografia, com o mayor da cidade, usando uma gravata MT.

Ainda que numa perspectiva de alarmismo de direita, muito a jeito das maquinações da FOX, a previsão de uma revolução nos Estados Unidos, como consequência de estar a evoluir rapidamente para o estatuto de uma nação não-desenvolvida ("undeveloped"), foi anunciada em 10 de Novembro de 2008 pelo homem que aparentemente previu a queda da União Soviética, a crise bolsista asiática de 1997, o descalabro do Subprime e a desvalorização sem precedentes da moeda americana. O mau agoiro vem de Gerald Celente, e vale a pena consultar esta referência: Celente Predicts Revolution, Food Riots, Tax Rebellions By 2012.

A recente histeria de Dick Cheney a propósito da política anti-terrorista de Barak Obama, afirmando que a mesma expõe os Estados Unidos "a atentados nucleares ou biológicos muito graves" (SIC), vai na mesma direcção.

Como se pode ler na newsletter do Bloco de Esquerda, há aliás mais gente, desta vez em quadrante radicalmente oposto, a pensar que estamos mesmo no início de uma verdadeira metamorfose:
Numa entrevista à revista inglesa Socialist Review, o marxista István Mészàros analisa a crise económica mundial e critica aqueles que apostam que ela será resolvida trazendo de volta as ideias keynesianas e a regulação. "É uma fantasia que uma solução neo-keynesiana e um novo Bretton Woods resolveriam qualquer dos problemas dos dias atuais", defende Mészàros. Para ele, estamos vivendo a maior crise na história humana, em todos os sentidos.

Não temos escrito neste blogue sobre outra coisa nos últimos três anos. E é por isso que penso ser urgente atacar sem hesitação o Bloco Central da Corrupção, por forma a salvar o PS e o PSD, mas acima de tudo, regenerar a tempo o actual regime democrático, sem o que os desafios que temos pela frente correm sérios riscos de empurrar Portugal para mais uma ditadura, ainda que inicialmente disfarçada de mais democracia! Os artigos recentes de Bagão Feliz —A força da mentira— e de Mário Crespo —Está bem, façamos de conta—não podem ser mais esclarecedores, especialmente junto do grande público, da gravidade da situação em que nos encontramos. Ou a Justiça põe na prisão rapidamente quem lá merece estar, ou Cavaco Silva terá que assumir até ao fim as suas obrigações de Estado.

Entretanto, enquanto governo e parlamento se auto-diluem no charco que criaram, recomendo vivamente a Cavaco Silva e a alguns políticos atentos, como Paulo Rangel, Francisco Louçã, Medina Carreira, Bagão Félix e Campos e Cunha, que leiam atentamente o rol das medidas do programa de estímulos sucessivamente esquissado pelo Congresso, e depois aprovado pela Câmara dos Representantes dos EUA. Servirá, pelo menos, para que aumentemos a fasquia de exigência do Plano de Emergência que há muito reclamo para o nosso país (2).

Breaking Down The Stimulus Bill

06-02-2009 (CNBC) — A comparison of the $827 billion economic recovery plan drafted by Senate Democrats and moderate Republicans with a $820 billion version passed by the House. Additional debt costs would add about $350 billion or more over 10 years. Many provisions expire in two years.


NOTAS
  1. Esta chegou enquanto escrevia este postal:
    Organizing for America
    Antonio --

    Americans have organized Economic Recovery House Meetings in all 50 states -- including 382 in California, 255 in Florida, 115 in Ohio, 199 in New York, 105 in Washington, and 149 in Texas.

    That's more than 3,587 meetings in 1,579 cities and 429 congressional districts.

    This past weekend, meeting hosts and guests watched a video of Governor Tim Kaine answering your questions about the president's recovery plan. Then they shared their own stories about how the crisis has affected them.

    Watch Governor Kaine's video and share your economic crisis story.

    Watch the video

    The media is filled with numbers about the economic crisis. But the numbers do not tell the full story.

    The story of this crisis is in homes across the country -- homes where a family member has lost a job, where parents are struggling to pay a mortgage, and where college tuition has slipped out of reach.

    That's also where the story of our recovery begins -- in communities where repairing roads and bridges, manufacturing green technologies, and rehabilitating our schools and hospitals will directly impact the lives of ordinary people and their families.

    President Obama's recovery plan will help struggling families right now by saving or creating up to 4 million jobs. But it will also help strengthen our economy for the future by investing in crucial infrastructure projects in health care, education, and energy.

    Share your story about how this economic crisis is affecting you and your family and join your fellow Americans in supporting bold action to speed our recovery:

    http://my.barackobama.com/sharestories

    Thank you for organizing so much support at this crucial moment for our country,

    Mitch

    Mitch Stewart
    Director
    Organizing for America

  2. Escrito em Outubro de 2005
    Muito antes das datas previstas nos cenários pró-Ota (...) Portugal ver-se-à na contingência de ter que redesenhar dramaticamente as suas prioridades de desenvolvimento (...). A brutal crise energética chegará muito mais cedo do que se prevê. E antes dela (ainda na vigência do actual governo) chegará também um mais do que provável "crash" imobiliário. Sem precisar de consultar cartas astrológicas, um número crescente de especialistas vem advertindo os governos de todo o mundo para o que se poderá passar num planeta subitamente consciente do declínio acelerado e irreversível das suas duas principais fontes energéticas: o petróleo e o gás natural. Mitigar este cenário mais do que certo exigirá avultados investimentos públicos e privados, que serão tanto maiores quanto mais próximos estivermos do colapso energético global.

    A prioridade das prioridades, em Portugal, como em toda a Europa, é criar uma rede capilar de transportes rodoviários, ferroviários, marítimos e aéreos altamente sustentáveis, divergindo rapidamente da dependência exclusiva dos combustíveis fósseis. Os Estados deverão concentrar-se na construção muito dispendiosa destas infraestruturas (e no apoio à investigação científica e tecnológica apropriada), deixando aos privados o papel de explorar, em regime de concorrência vigiada, o correspondente material circulante: camiões, comboios, barcos e aviões. O transporte individual tal como o conhecemos hoje desaparecerá muito rapidamente, devido aos custos insuportáveis de veículos e combustíveis, mas também devido à insolvência de milhões famílias por essa Europa fora.

    A segunda prioridade inadiável é a autonomia alimentar local. Temos que reconstruir rapidamente as cinturas verdes das cidades com mais de 100 mil habitantes, tendo como objectivo inegociável a criação de capacidades básicas de auto-abastecimento alimentar.

    A terceira prioridade é parar imediatamente com a actividade imobiliária especulativa, interrompendo pura e simplesmente toda a actividade de construção civil desnecessária. Os recursos técnicos, logísticos e humanos até agora empregues nesta actividade inútil e tonta deverão ser desviados para a consecução das grandes obras de infra-estruturas prioritárias a serem lançadas imediatamente como vértice fundamental de uma estratégia de mitigação da aproximação do "crash" energético.

    A quarta prioridade é reorganizar radicalmente o actual aparelho de Estado, eliminando tudo o que for dispensável. Precisamos de um Estado de Emergência. Mais vale perceber isto agora, do que esperar por uma metamorfose repentina, anárquica, tumultuosa e violenta.

    A quinta prioridade é relançar a Democracia...

    in O António Maria, 28-10-2005

OAM 534 09-02-2009 19:07 (última actualização: 10-02-2009 01:07)

sábado, fevereiro 07, 2009

Portugal 87

O fim do emprego
e o desafio de Louçã...

«É um princípio de um sistema bancário público em que possa predominar uma política socialista, uma política pública com orientações para escolhas sociais para a economia. É exactamente assim que faria um ministro das Finanças que fosse do Bloco de Esquerda» — Francisco Louçã in “New Crisis, Old System”; VI Convenção do Bloco de Esquerda (06-02-2009).

Francisco Louçã propôs hoje a proibição dos despedimentos em empresas que tenham resultados, elegendo o combate ao desemprego e a nacionalização de sectores estratégicos como resposta ideológica e prática à "crise do regime" (Lusa/SIC).


"Perhaps as little as 5 percent of the adult population will be needed to manage and operate the traditional industrial sphere by the year 2050. Near-workless farms, factories, and offices will be the norm in every country".

— in Jeremy Rifkin, The End of Work (1995, 2004).


There is cause to think the problems in the financial sector remain grim despite the huge amount they have received from taxpayers and that there are few sources of growth in the private economy. Consumers are strapped and business won't invest until recovery has begun. The model is broken. Default rates are rising for auto loans, credit cards, and other forms of borrowing. Commercial real estate which expanded 40 percent in the three years after 2005 (when housing loan expansion peaked). We have reached the end of the regime of accumulation that started in the late 1970s which featured financialization - growth through massive debt creation and speculation as a defining characteristic - deindustrialization and globalization.

— in The Present Crisis of Capitalism, Its Short and Long Term Implications. By William Tabb.

Entre o nariz de Sócrates que não pára de crescer e o descontrolo retórico do pigmeu Augusto Santos Silva, o Bloco de Esquerda chega aos dois dígitos nas sondagens — já aqui tínhamos previsto, a 28 de Janeiro, 11% de intenções. Importa pois começar a discutir o que quer o Bloco de Esquerda quando for governo, provavelmente associado ao Partido Socialista que sobreviver a José Sócrates e à tríade que colocou este pinóquio no sítio onde está para vergonha de qualquer lusitano com a espinal medula no sítio.

Ideias frescas vindas do Bloco? Pois que venham!

Louçã, enviou-nos, para já, três recados:
  • se for ministro das finanças, irá proibir que as empresas com 'resultados' despeçam;
  • se for ministro das finanças, nacionalizará sectores estratégicos da nossa economia como resposta à 'crise de regime';
  • se for ministro das finanças, iniciará a formação de um sistema bancário público dotado de uma política predominantemente socialista.
Nada que o Reino Unido e a América de Obama não estejam dispostos a subscrever de cruz. Mas não chega. Nem sequer para alterar o sistema fiduciário de valor que conduziu à actual crise sistémica mundial, para o que faltaria acabar, por exemplo, com os gnomos e testas de ferro da especulação mundial, mais o chamado shadow banking (Banco Privado e quejandos), a economia de casino, e as sofisticadas arquitecturas computacionais responsáveis pelo buraco negro dos derivados. É preciso ir ainda mais fundo: até à divisão internacional do trabalho, até à repartição dos recursos energéticos e naturais disponíveis —que chineses e russos querem mais equitativa—, e de caminho, até às actuais regras do comércio mundial.

EU threatens legal action over American car industry bail-out

(03-02-2009) The EU today threatened legal action and retaliatory measures against the US if the Obama administration enshrines a "Buy American" clause in its multibillion-dollar economic stimulus package.

...The most contentious clause in EU eyes would require US firms to use local steel and other components in state-funded projects. Similar national measures have been adopted or considered in Argentina, China, Indonesia, Ecuador, India, Russia and Vietnam, putting them on a WTO ­surveillance list. — (Guardian.co.uk)

Quando Obama decide indexar os apoios estatais à indústria americana ao consumo de aço Made in USA, pondo em causa cláusulas anti-proteccionistas fundamentais assinadas pelos membros da OMC, o caminho, aqui há vários meses anunciado, do regresso ao proteccionismo está aberto. Há já algum tempo que defendo a necessidade de um novo Tratado de Tordesilhas, desta vez entre a Ásia e a Euro-América. O grande Médio Oriente e a África serão as áreas de disputa entre os novos blocos planetários. A Rússia, que começou a reconstituir paulatinamente o seu espaço vital, permanecerá o pêndulo angustiante entre o Oriente e o Ocidente, cumprindo assim uma velha tradição!

Para já, a Europa está cada vez mais nervosa com a evolução tectónica vertiginosa em curso. Barafusta contra os Estados Unidos, enquanto o garnisé de Paris recomenda às empresas francesas subsidiadas que consumam materiais e serviços franceses, o sonâmbulo de Downing Street faz discursos xenófobos, e uma parlamentar europeia da reaccionária Polónia repudia prisioneiros de Guantánamo, não apenas no seu país, mas em toda a União Europeia!

A moeda europeia (1), apesar das suas ambições, poderá em breve sofrer um enorme trambolhão. Basta para tal que alguns dos seus países membros entrem em processos de falência semelhantes ao da Islândia. O Reino Unido (2), a Grécia e Portugal, já para não mencionar a Ucrânia e a Hungria, estão a um passo de suspender pagamentos internacionais. Se e quando tal acontecer, o Euro começará a resvalar, haverá inflação ou mesmo hiperinflação na Europa, e surgirão finalmente novas moedas de reserva regionais — na América, na Ásia e nas petro-monarquias do Médio Oriente.

Parar as privatizações em curso num país à beira da falência, de que é exemplo a criminosa operação de venda ao desbarato da ANA, única e exclusivamente para ajudar a financiar a construção do desnecessário NAL de Alcochete; travar a intrusão inopinada e abusiva da Iberdrola na rede de barragens e sistema hídrico nacionais (3), sob os auspícios diligentes do vende-pátrias Pina Moura; desfazer a escandalosa apropriação indevida desse bem público inalienável que é a água por parte dos piratas do Bloco Central da Corrupção (investigue-se o Instituto da Água quanto antes!); e preparar o país para um verdadeiro raid de nacionalizações e renacionalizações dos seus principais recursos estratégicos, ditado por razões de Estado, e não para recompensar especuladores e ladrões de toda espécie, como tem vindo a fazer o actual governo de direita, do PS, a propósito do BCP, BPN e BPP, eis alguns detalhes da coisa pública que o Bloco de Esquerda tem que começar a explicar aos seus eleitores se quiser saltar dos actuais 10% de expectativas para o ambicioso desiderato de rachar ao meio o actual PS, com ou sem Alegre.

Terá, por outro lado, que ser mais claro nas suas intenções e propor desde já medidas precisas sobre, por exemplo, as execuções das hipotecas imobiliárias que parecem estar a disparar e em breve ameaçarão aqueles milhares de portugueses que, como bem descreveu Elisabeth Warren, em Two Income Trap, caírem numa ou mais de três situações críticas: perda de emprego, divórcio (4), ou doença prolongada. A Caixa Geral de Depósitos, governada por piratas do Bloco Central da Corrupção, que vem aliviando escandalosamente as perdas colossais de Joe Berardo e chafurda no lodo do BPN e do BCC, é a mesma instituição que avança sem vergonha —e com a polícia de choque à frente, se for preciso— para a expulsão de famílias inteiras de apartamentos cujas hipotecas foram executadas, recolocando depois os apartamentos recuperados como garantias executadas no mercado da especulação. É uma vergonha vê-los a fazer leilões obscenos por esse país fora!

Para os chineses a palavra crise tem dois significados: por um lado, proclama a existência de um drama, por outro, alerta para a emergência de uma oportunidade!

O fracasso do neoliberalismo que os piratas que tomaram conta do PS abraçaram fatalmente (5), mas de que o colapso económico-financeiro em curso é a moral mais cristalina, deve ser aproveitado para corrigir o actual regime político, ao mesmo tempo que é crucial aproveitar quanto antes a oportunidade de proceder a uma profunda e urgente limpeza do lixo acumulado nos cantos da democracia.

O escândalo Freeport (6) é um escândalo político, pois os muitos casos de polícia que encerra têm origens e desenvolvimentos partidários. Deixar morrer mais um exemplo da corrupção que tolhe e faz apodrecer a democracia portuguesa seria um sinal não só de cobardia cívica, mas acima de tudo de uma enorme estupidez estratégica.

Franciso Louçã lançou um desafio. Não sei ainda se estará à altura da jogada. O tempo está, no entanto, a seu favor. Que pena terem deixado cair a Joana Amaral Dias! Com um pouco de MT ia lá. Seguramente muito melhor que o hirto Fazenda, para as lides que se avizinham.


NOTAS
  1. The Euro at ten: Is its future secure?
    By Simon Tilford, in Centre For European Reform - essays. (PDF)

    The euro is riding high on the foreign exchange markets, and the financial crisis has graphically illustrated that euro membership provides a safe haven. On the face of it, this would seem to be a strange time to question the stability of the currency union. But this essay argues that the euro is about to face its first serious test, and that the stability of the eurozone cannot be taken for granted.

  2. Today's Trope: Britain May Need IMF Bailout

    Asking for an IMF bailout is among the worst things countries can do in terms of damaging national prestige. It's the global political economy equivalent of cadging distant relatives (i.e., "the international community") for money to help tide you over. I've covered several of the most recent approaches to the IMF including Iceland, Ukraine, and Hungary. Now, the leader of the British Conservatives, David Cameron, is leading a charge that the United Kingdom may soon go hat in hand to un grand seducteur Dominique Strauss-Kahn. — in IPEZONE.

  3. Se daqui a dois ou três anos a Iberdrola for nacionalizada pelo Estado espanhol, em que situação fica o controlo português sobre a energia, as albufeiras e os sistemas de irrigação associados às barragens que o actual governo —por cupidez pura e dificuldades de tesouraria— quer entregar a uma empresa tipicamente protegida, e bem, pelos governos espanhóis?

  4. É por isto que Cavaco Silva e a Igreja têm razão na questão da lei do divórcio. O problema não é já ideológico, mas de pura gestão de uma das principais crises estruturais do sistema capitalista. Quando é que a bronca Esquerda ideológica começa a pensar pela sua própria cabeça, e abandona os manuais desactualizados do maniqueísmo pseudo-marxista?

  5. A cantilena pró-socialista de esquerda assumida recentemente por José Sócrates não passa disso mesmo, de mais uma ladaínha do vendedor de cobertores de Vilar de Maçada. Na realidade, o que o actual primeiro ministro e a tríade de Macau estão a montar pela calada é uma verdadeira rede de interesses económicos privados destinada a expropriar o país dos seus principais recursos e infraestruturas! Trata-se de um roubo em larga escala, articulado com vastas manobras internacionais, onde pontuam, vejam só, grandes almirantados da pirataria mundial, como por exemplo, a célebre Carlyle. A mesma que, pelos vistos, há algum tempo atrás espevitou o fogo escandaloso do Freeport! Porque seria?

    Vale a pena ler com atenção, a este propósito, esta esclarecedora passagem de "The Present Crisis of Capitalism, Its Short and Long Term Implications", por William Tabb:
    The Carlyle Group has a team raising a billion dollar fund to focus on U.S. infrastructure, such as rail, airports, water assets, as well as schools and hospitals.

    There are many other such entrepreneurial endeavor. GE and Credit Suisse have a new global fund to invest in power plants, pipelines, airports, railroads and toll roads. GE can contract many parts of the deal to its other divisions which can provide inputs and systems for the infrastructure projects.

    Governments contracting with such providers will know less about the details and costs than the providing consortia.

    Such arrangements have long been pushed on developing countries by the World Bank and other funders. As in the instances of other aspects of neoliberalism first demanded of weaker developing nations which have become part of the policy givens in the United States and some other advanced economies such a new paradigm is coming unless there is a reassertion of the capacities of the public sector here.

    As Jenny Anderson reported in the New York Times not long ago, "Reeling from more exotic investments that imploded during the credit crisis, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, the Carlyle Group, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse are among the investors who have amassed an estimated $250 billion war chest much of it raised in the last two years to finance a tidal wave of infrastructure projects in the United States and overseas."

    Norman Y. Mineta, a former secretary of transportation was hired by Credit Suisse as a senior adviser to such deals. Other former public servants are lining up for such positions as intermediaries between private and public at handsome remuneration.

    Given growing public deficits, like third world countries Let us hope and work to see that America will not give away its roads, bridges and airports in exchange for the promise of better maintenance by the private sector. The taxpayer will get immediate relief and long term dependence on for profit owners.
  6. Rui Gonçalves, secretário de Estado do Ambiente de Sócrates que aprovou o licenciamento do Freeport, é desde Abril de 2008 vogal da Empresa Geral de Fomento e, por inerência, assumiu os cargos de presidente dos conselhos de administração da Valnor, da Rebat, da Resat, da Residouro e ainda de vogal da Valorsul, passando a presidir a partir de Setembro de 2008 à Resistrela (criada para gerir resíduos sólidos urbanos em parte da Beira Interior). Todas estas empresas da área do saneamento básico foram criadas por José Sócrates quando era ministro do Ambiente. De 2002 a 2005 foi professor convidado da Universidade Independente.

REFERÊNCIAS
  • ¿Vuelve Keynes?
    Por Ignacio Sotelo

    7-02-2009 (El País) La actual socialdemocracia está impulsando un falso keynesianismo: el Estado, con el dinero de todos, salva bancos y empresas, pero la propiedad, y con ella la capacidad de decidir, queda en manos privadas.

    ... Al mostrar que la inversión no está ligada al ahorro, sino a las perspectivas de ganancia, Keynes critica el supuesto equilibrio entre producción y consumo que había constatado la economía clásica, en función de la cual el desempleo desciende si bajan los salarios y en general los costos de producción. Keynes recalca que si se bajan los salarios, al encogerse la demanda global, se obtiene el efecto contrario: más paro. Además, una política de achicamiento de los salarios no sólo es poco razonable, es que ni siquiera resulta factible. Bajar los salarios, con los conflictos sociales que comporta, sólo se lograría en un régimen autoritario que hubiera suprimido, entre otras, la libertad sindical.

    ... Keynes no sólo plantea, si fuese preciso, volver al proteccionismo, sino que pone en tela de juicio la prerrogativa exclusiva del empresario de decidir en qué y cuándo invierte su dinero, algo que atañe a la esencia misma del capitalismo. La aporía intrínseca del sistema radica en que no puede mantener el pleno empleo sin garantizar previamente las inversiones de la manera más conveniente para la economía nacional, y no simplemente para el interés del inversor. Y no hay "mano invisible" que haga converger el interés general con el egoísmo individual. Keynes fue claro: "Creo que una socialización bastante completa de las inversiones será el único medio de aproximarse a la ocupación plena".

    ... Nadie invierte para crear puestos de trabajo, por mucho que una monserga constante insista en que la inversión privada es el factor principal para reducir el paro. En vísperas de elecciones, los partidos prometen bajar los impuestos para aumentar los beneficios de las empresas, lo que, dicen, redundará en inversiones que creen puestos de trabajo, como si hubiese una relación directa entre cuantía del capital disponible y monto de las inversiones.

    ... Las dos recetas que ofrece Keynes para garantizar el pleno empleo -proteccionismo y socialización de las inversiones- no encajan en el capitalismo en su forma liberal primigenia, pero mucho menos la primera en la época de la globalización y la segunda cuando se ha hundido el movimiento obrero.

    ... ¿Vuelve Keynes? En la crisis que ha desencadenado la total desregularización, los dueños de los bienes financieros y de producción necesitan dinero público en cantidades ingentes. Amenazan con que, de no recibirlos, podría ocurrir que se derrumbase el sistema. Pero aun en situación tan extrema, de ningún modo están dispuestos a asumir el más elemental de sus principios, a saber, que el que pone el dinero adquiere la propiedad y decide. El Estado, con el dinero de todos, estaría obligado a salvar bancos y empresas, pero la propiedad, y con ella la capacidad de decidir, debe quedar en manos privadas.

    ... La relectura que se hace de Keynes para justificar el enorme endeudamiento público que conlleva las ayudas a bancos y grandes empresas contradice por completo las intenciones de Keynes. Lo más grave es que la socialdemocracia de nuestros días haga suya esta interpretación.

  • The Un-stimulating Stimulus
    By Martin Hutchinson (Prudent Bear)

    February 02, 2009 — Until the House Republican revolt this week, there has been a worldwide consensus that the way to get out of a deep recession is through fiscal "stimulus" – gigantic gobs of public spending that explode the budget deficit but provide jobs to those without them. It’s a theory first publicized by John Maynard Keynes, but it rests on a central fallacy: the "job-providing" expenditures have to be financed somehow, and their financing may crowd out other private-sector projects that would have created more jobs.

    ... Of the roughly $850 billion in expenditures and tax rebates outlined above, only roughly $81 billion in expenditures and $13 billion in tax reductions would have any economic spin-off effect or supply-side effect respectively. That's 11% of the total, much of it being spent in 2011 or later. All the remainder would have a Keynesian multiplier of 1.0 or less, in other words run the risk of being on a net basis damaging to the economy by sucking resources out of other more productive uses.

    Add to the above the financing and inflationary problems produced by a federal budget deficit that was already out of control before this "stimulus" and the waste and corruption inevitable in government programs of this size (such as the infamous "Davis-Bacon" provisions adding 20% to federal construction costs by requiring unionized labor). Add also damaging requirements such as the "Buy America" provisions in relation to steel and manufactured goods, which significantly raise the danger of a trade war that would hugely damage the U.S. and world economy.

    It becomes pretty clear that, far from repeating the successes of the Interstate Highway System, the proposed economic stimulus is likely to have a net depressant effect on the U.S. economy. Misguided large-scale government activities of this kind produced the disaster of the Great Depression in the United States at a time when Britain among other countries was able to achieve economic recovery by pursuing the opposite policy of state retrenchment.

  • From Financial Crisis to Sustainable Global Economy
    By Jonathan Lash on January 29, 2009

    Much of the world’s attention is fixed on the brutal effects of the global financial crisis. But sooner or later—sooner we hope—the global economy will rebound. Markets will recover, and stocks will rise. Nature, on the other hand, does not do bailouts. The effects of today’s greenhouse gas emissions—like those of yesterday and tomorrow—will be permanent, at least in the timescales that we care about.

    ... Economic recovery around the world will be driven by thousands of firms in each country making decisions about what products to make, what technologies to use, and who to hire. It is essential that these decisions incorporate the risks and opportunities presented by a carbon-and-resource constrained world. It is critical that they create jobs in building the products that will help improve lives with reduced impact on the Earth’s resources.

    ... Right now is the best opportunity I have seen in 30 years as an environmentalist to align economic, social and environmental goals. The United States Climate Action Partnership, of which WRI is a founding member, and whose 26 corporate members include General Electric, Duke Energy, DuPont and General Motors, last week renewed and strengthened its call for the U.S. Congress to adopt a mandatory national cap and trade system to reduce current U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050. (Texto integral)

  • The Present Crisis of Capitalism, Its Short and Long Term Implications
    By William Tabb

    A talk given to actists @ the Left Labor Project, January 6, 2009.

    The title for my talk I was given is too ambitious by far but I think the intent is to have a discussion of where we are in economic-political history and that is what I shall offer starting with two ways of looking at the coming year(s) for the economy. The predictions for 2009 come in two persuasions. The economists views generally speaking are summed up by the Financial Times as "Whatever happens, 2009 will not be pleasant" and it will be "a year to forget." The Economist greeted the New Year in its January 3rd issue with an Economic Focus "Diagnosing Depression." enlightening us that since the word seemed to be "popping up more often" it would explain criteria for distinguishing a depression from a recession the latter being a decline in real GDP that exceeds 10% or one that lasts more than three years. Since this one began in December 2007 we are off to a good or perhaps bad start. Previous bad recessions in 1973-75 and 1981-2 each lasted 16 months. No one believes this one will be shorter. Yesterday the Federal Reserve announced their shock at how bad things have gotten in the last month. If history has lessons for us it is that financial crises, even ones as bad as the one we have on for years not months, unemployment rises and output falls by large amounts.


    On the other side are forecasts from people selling stock. They predict recovery to occur at the end of 2009. Some economists agree. However such reassurance comes from many of the same folks who said a nationwide fall in American house prices was impossible and that financial innovation had made the financial system more resilient, so The Economist was not altogether impressed by the optimists. Nor am I for reasons to which I now turn.


    There is cause to think the problems in the financial sector remain grim despite the huge amount they have received from taxpayers and that there are few sources of growth in the private economy. Consumers are strapped and business won't invest until recovery has begun. The model is broken. Default rates are rising for auto loans, credit cards, and other forms of borrowing. Commercial real estate which expanded 40 percent in the three years after 2005 (when housing loan expansion peaked). We have reached the end of the regime of accumulation that started in the late 1970s which featured financialization - growth through massive debt creation and speculation as a defining characteristic - deindustrialization and globalization.


    US-based transnational capital sought both markets and production venues elsewhere and squeezed labor harder. Money was made not only from intensifying exploitation in ways business union leaders were unprepared for since they were still looking for class cooperation when, as the head of the UAW at the time, Douglas Fraser, explained capital was waging a one-sided class war. Foreign competition from Japan and later other Asian exporters was a major factor along with U.S. producers increasingly moving off-shore and introducing more capital saving technology. For the last forty years or so the American workers's income has stagnated, benefits and job security eroded and in the privatization, anti-tax-anti government climate public services deteriorated. Companies have increasingly maximized short term returns, corporate raiders and private buyout firms have restructured much of American industry, working people have borrowed more and personal debt grew dramatically. As Linda Bilmes and Joe Stiglitz have written "In the eight years since George W. Bush took office, nearly every component of the U.S. economy has deteriorated." We know the broad strokes if not the numbers - 5 million increase in the number without health insurance, 4 million manufacturing jobs gone, consumer debt has dubbed and nearly a fifth of homeowners owe more than their home is worth and between 2002 and 2006 the wealthiest 10% of households received 95% of all income gains. The Iraq war built on a lie will end up costing at least three trillion and we don't count the Iraqi people killed, wounded and displaced. This was paid for with borrowed money, mostly from foreigners. One in eight Americans the USDA tells us is "food insecure," that is they don't get enough to eat. Food banks are overwhelmed. In December 608,000 Americans, 74% more than last year are not seeking work because they think no jobs are available. They are not counted as unemployed only "discouraged. I don't have to go on. American consumers cannot borrow any more and are actually paying down debt levels they cannot sustain as best they can. Spending is falling, unemployment will keep rising into the foreseeable future. More bubbles will burst as Americans pay down unaffordable debt and demand for energy and other raw materials and the output of manufactured goods they create continue to decline.


    In the United States in 2008 two million manufacturing jobs were lost. Everywhere now manufacturing activity is falling, even in China and India, in Germany, France, Italy and Spain, in Japan and Hong Kong. While the stock market in the United States last year fell by more than it has since 1931, by 38 percent, with devastating impacts on the retirement prospects of millions of American workers this was considerably less than the losses in the rest of the world where comparable stock indices fell by 46 percent. In Iceland by 90 percent due to the financial excesses caused by deregulation and outrageous expansion of their bank's borrowing in foreign currencies. But losses were also worse than in the U.S. in Japan, France, Italy, Sweden, South Korea, Brazil, China and India among others. It is not only in the United States that the share of gross national product that goes to wages has declined while the share going to capital has increased, this has happened in three quarters of the countries in the world according to the International Labor Organization between 1995 and 2007.


    The systemic challenge may be greater than the current discussion and certainly policy measures reflect. Dependence on unsustainable levels of debt and global capital flows reflect the stagnationist tendencies of the advanced economies and the shift in where production takes place globally, processes of combined and uneven development inherent in capitalism but which now reach crisis proportions. International negotiation and coordination is imperative but difficult. As in the Great Depression each nation's capitalists (and their workers) will be inclined to become more intensely nationalistic. A crucial dimension of the seriousness of the situation is the foreign debt of the United States which has been running huge current account deficit and borrowing from the rest of the world at an unsustainable rate. The global imbalance is difficult to address. The U.S. must consume less. China will have to let its people consume more. The great increase in the US deficit necessary in the current crisis will increase foreign borrowing worsening the imbalance. Other big issues such as resource limits and global warming will have to be faced and will impact, or should impact how and what is produced. These too represent major crises for capitalism and need to be faced.


    The damage caused by the financialization of the last three decades or so is enormous. It is likely without it stagnation would have come sooner. It was the borrowing that kept the economies growing and trade flowing. But the high leverage which allowed investment banks to borrow 97 cents for every three pennies they had in their own capital is over. The NINJA loans (no income no job or assets) for home buyers are no more. Housing will take years to recover and again not only in the United States. The hedge funds and buyout firms face redemptions and many are going belly up along with the banks which lent to them - or these banks would collapse if your tax dollars weren't being showered on them. The subprime loans we have heard so much about some $1.5 trillion worth were packaged and leveraged to roughly $140 trillion in fictitious capital, "a global pyramid of junk" as Nomi Prins writes. The stronger banks are buying up the weaker ones, usually with federal assistance for most of the risk. And still the banks aren't lending, companies can't borrow, and consumer credit is being limited. Where is economic growth going to come from?


    The answer of course is the government. We also wait for a new long term growth paradigm. Financialization was tried, produced speculative bubbles, and collapsed despite efforts by Paulson and Bernanke to put Humpty- Dumpty back together again. It is over as the source of economy-wide growth. The only hope on the horizon are the huge spending projects Obama has proposed. There is no choice for two reasons. If he doesn't there will be another Great Depression and second as Christia Freeland, Financial Times chief correspondent in the U.S. wrote in a remarkable column headed "Friction over greedy bosses lets loose genie of class politics," begins "This week America discovered class warfare;" Americans have woken up to a nightmare. Their way of life, or the life they aspired to, is a dream in a very different sense than the phrase usually has conjured. There has been a lot written, especially before the election of the breakdown of trust in corporate and political leadership. David Gergen who heads the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard University wrote that "Over the last few years the trust between the public and the elites has completely collapsed." Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia similarly offered the opinion that "The greed and corruption of the corporate class in America is behind this public revolt." This latent but increasingly visible class hatred was a factor in electing America's first Black president.


    The election of Barack Obama and a Democratic congress changes some of this. In the incoming president's stimulus package which gets bigger by the week as the economy sank and the departing Bush hands in pockets looked on there is hope that the crisis will be less disastrous. But while much is to be supported in his proposals they may still be too little and parts of it are misdirected. This is partly because the Republicans cling to pre-Keynesian ideas that government should not spent too much and balance budgets as quickly as possible. They are supported by Blue Dog Democrats keeping federal spending measures too low to end the crisis. If the Republicans follow their House Leader John Boehner's lead and agree with his November 2008 statement that "We're in tough economic times....More Washington spending isn't the answer" they will undercut the recovery agenda. They are aware that if a real new New Deal saves us they will be out of power for decades. They must as a survival tactic for their party subvert economic recovery while seeming to stand up for principled responsible behavior.


    In any case what appears (and is in fact) as a huge increase in federal spending of $760 billion (5.3% of GDP) as proposed by Obama economists is not enough. Unemployment will continue to rise over the next two years even with this stimulus and federal debt will row substantially requiring huge increases in foreign borrowing. Because American manufacturing has been decimated over recent decades much of the tax cut will be spent on imports increasing the current account balance of payment deficit. Global imbalances as I shall say more about will become central to solving what is a worldwide crisis.


    Polls show two-thirds of Americans support new spending to stimulate the economy but 56% worry government will spend too much. Republicans use this as a bargaining chip with Obama to push his program toward tax cuts which benefit the affluent and especially business tax cuts which it is claimed will stimulate investment. But new orders for manufacturing are at their lowest level since the end of WW II. With no growth and expectations of continued falling sales there will be little new investment this way. The money spent on public needs does produce jobs and increases spending. Mitch McConnell the Republican leader in the Senate wants aid to cities and states to be loans not grants, a way to keep the amount down when the need to maintain their spending should be obvious. Retailers are practically giving stuff away to cut their inventories after the worst holiday season in memory and the conservatives cling to their "government is the problem" mantra of low spending and lower taxes. While liberals worked to use government to save capitalism yet again the left perhaps grateful that Bush is gone and reformers are back in. But unless there is working class pressure the center will cave to the right on important matters pertaining to the priorities of ordinary citizens.


    If there is concern with too large deficits they could pay for the spending with serious tax reform, returning the share the rich pay to what it was before Ronald Reagan for example. Such taxes collected from the upper one percent could go a long way to simulating growth since the rich do not spend it but the money recycled to cutting payroll taxes for example would be spent by workers and give an incentive for employers since it would lower their labor costs (Kuttner, 2009:14). Republicans would see this as class warfare of course but the argument could be made it is a pragmatic policy for increasing spending without increasing the deficit. Of course it could be argued that some serious class struggle is exactly what is needed in the face of the catastrophe the greed of capital has produced.


    The Obama strategy proposals do suggest a new, if still conceived of a as temporary regime of accumulation in government-led industrial policy and public investment. It is too early to tell how radical the intervention will be but as I say there are political constraints that would have to be overcome and Obama's preference for bipartisan cooperation are not encouraging. He has already agreed to tax cuts which make no sense as a priority use of $300 billion to get conservative support. Compared to Paulson who moved to save the banks without "punishing" them, that is the stockholders and top executives or forcing them to start lending again and offered little else (the dud banks should have been shut down or nationalized for real) the Obama activism is admirable. It also reflects a new way, or rather a return to an older way of thinking about government functions. It is New Deal employment creation with the rationale of investing for the future rather than income redistribution. Certainly there is need for school building repair, infrastructure spending and broadband expansion. Energy efficiency in federal buildings (the government is the largest real estate owner in the country) would save money for tax payers and energy of course and could be a model for similar efforts by others. The letting public facilities decay is scandalous of course and rehabilitating the public purpose is an important change in direction. They are necessary. So are assistance to local and state governments and help to people without health care, those losing their income and their homes. The logic is smart government to meet obvious need as well as stimulate growth. It will not be enough but it is a start.


    There is much to be undone and repaired. Consider health care. Peter Orszag, Obama's head of the White House Office of Management and Budget is calling for comprehensive health reform as the "key to our fiscal future." That is, he is not saying it is an expensive program but people need it. He is saying health care reform is necessary to save money, not by spending less but by spending more and changing health care delivery so that it does not consume the future federal budget. He wants to prevent higher spending unrelated to better outcomes, digitizing health records to save tens millions of dollars in the future, and bringing real efficiencies rather than cutting needed health care services. We shall have to see what happens but it is a better approach than slashing Welfare State services. But again this is a time when more could be done to push the balance of class forces between capital and labor and to expose what the logic of capital costs us.


    It is unlikely there will be more radical steps to challenge the causes of ill health. The government will still subsidize high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oil so that bigger bottles of Coke can continue to be sold cheaply along with potato chips, creating obesity and the diabetes epidemic. The Department of Agriculture will sponsor unhealthy lunch programs. Industrial hog farms will be subsidized to pollute the surrounding area without proper regulation of waste disposal, the energy and toxic chemical intensive industrial farming will go unchallenged, and the rest. The ecological crisis cannot be put on hold waiting for recovery. The cancer causing pollutants industry creates will not be controlled unless there are popular movements which offer a broad critique of the degradations of capitalism and specific analyses sector by sector of the harm it does. There must be a socio-environmental alternative to the current growth paradigm and yes to militarism hurts in so many ways one of which is it misdirects attention from human needs here and abroad.


    If we are not vigilant the infrastructure will be built in public-private partnerships giving control to private investors as has been happening and contracts given out Halliburton-style. How infrastructure projects are done matters. There is no reason the federal government following the privatization of so many functions once done by government employees but now outsourced to the likes of Halliburton to rebuild our infrastructure on such a model. Indeed it has a name, "the Infrastructure Privatization paradigm." It is seen as a win-win for cash strapped governments, the banks and other private investors looking for a new long term inflation linked (raise tolls and user fees when costs go up to keep income high) asset class. Infrastructure offers a combination of hard assets and visible long-term earning streams. The Carlyle Group has a team raising a billion dollar fund to focus on U.S. infrastructure, such as rail, airports, water assets, as well as schools and hospitals. There are many other such entrepreneurial endeavor. GE and Credit Suisse have a new global fund to invest in power plants, pipelines, airports, railroads and toll roads. GE can contract many parts of the deal to its other divisions which can provide inputs and systems for the infrastructure projects. Governments contracting with such providers will know less about the details and costs than the providing consortia. Such arrangements have long been pushed on developing countries by the World Bank and other funders. As in the instances of other aspects of neoliberalism first demanded of weaker developing nations which have become part of the policy givens in the United States and some other advanced economies such a new paradigm is coming unless there is a reassertion of the capacities of the public sector here. As Jenny Anderson reported in the New York Times not long ago, "Reeling from more exotic investments that imploded during the credit crisis, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, the Carlyle Group, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse are among the investors who have amassed an estimated $250 billion war chest much of it raised in the last two years to finance a tidal wave of infrastructure projects in the United States and overseas." Norman Y. Mineta, a former secretary of transportation was hired by Credit Suisse as a senior adviser to such deals. Other former public servants are lining up for such positions as intermediaries between private and public at handsome remuneration. Given growing public deficits, like third world countries Let us hope and work to see that America will not give away its roads, bridges and airports in exchange for the promise of better maintenance by the private sector. The taxpayer will get immediate relief and long term dependence on for profit owners. There will be pressure on the Obama administration to not "undermine the free market with too much government control."


    Financialization as an accumulation strategy has failed and brought on what began as the subprime crisis and then a financial crisis and is now a general global economic crisis of massive proportions. Neoliberalism has failed as a way to control the developing world and the US and the other countries of the core now face increasingly powerful countries of the global south who will not accept the IMF and WTO rules applied to their disadvantage. But these people are not simply going away. The money changers will ave to be driven from the temple. It is not clear at all that this is Obama's intention. His economic team is composed of the people who led the deregulation which created the financial crisis. Obama may be the vanguard of a new global Keynesianism and global social democracy in an effort to relegitimate a now widely discredited capitalism. Certainly multilateralism is better than Bush unilateralism and talking to enemies better than threats and violence as the responses of choice, environmental sustainability surely a better goal than refusing to sign up for even modest efforts like the Kyoto Treaty.


    Up to now Blairism and other Third Way social democratic accommodations to corporate globalization have been as discredited as the harsher versions of neoliberalism. The Europeans social democrats while criticizing US-style capitalism have moved to incorporate its logic so that their capitalists will not be left behind. The current crisis has to some degree ironically raised their stock as they reverse course and strengthen the state as an economic actor, picking up the rhetoric of progressive government involvement and it is surely the case that government will have to get capitalism out of the crisis it has created for itself and us. The question is what pressure will there be from labor and the left for more basic change if the recovery does not come in the next year or eighteen months and I do not think it will. Can Obama be pushed like FDR was? What are the demands? What are the organized vehicles for pressure? The left has been down so long it is not clear we know the answers to these questions but if the crisis is deep and long as in the 1930s movements will develop and demands will be articulated. We need to speed up the process. Obama will have a honeymoon period but if things do not get better soon more forceful socialization needs to be demanded. People before profits will confront capital's demand that growth can only come by giving them more first. It is this logic which will have to be challenged by the sort of progressive political movement of the kind that pushed Roosevelt in the 1930s.

    William K. Tabb is Professor Emeritus, Queens College, City University of New York. He is the author of The Amoral Elephant: Globalization and the Struggle for Social Justice in the Twenty-First Century (Monthly Review Press, 2001) among other publications.

    in lists.portside.org

OAM 533 08-02-2009 00:48 (última actualização: 09-02-2009 00:58)

quarta-feira, fevereiro 04, 2009

Portugal 86

Somos todos corruptos?

O silêncio atávico dos partidos com assento parlamentar, que só não afectou até agora o Bloco de Esquerda, sobre o alegado envolvimento de José Sócrates, ministro do ambiente à data dos eventos, e actual primeiro ministro, no chamado Caso Freeport, provoca uma espécie de cinismo opinativo em muitos portugueses, que interpreto assim:

  • há dois partidos que governam Portugal, e não se vislumbram alternativas credíveis no horizonte mais próximo, sobretudo depois da cangocha de Manuel Alegre;
  • estes dois partidos, o PS e o PSD, estão ambos, provavelmente em proporções idênticas, infestados de oportunistas e criminosos de colarinho branco;
  • logo, é inútil tomar partido, e sobretudo combatê-los;
  • por fim, há mesmo quem ache que, sendo o elegante Sócrates o protótipo perfeito de um aldrabão sedutor, sempre terá alguma vantagem mediática e eleitoral sobre a figura vitoriana e mal acompanhada que hoje dirige o PSD.

Paulo Portas está calado porque arrasta consigo ainda vários dossiers políticos explosivos às costas, do tempo dos submarinos europeus e dos passeios sedutores de pelo menos uma grande industrial de armamento norte-americana por Lisboa. Nobre Guedes ainda não recuperou do peso dos sobreiros que lhe sobraram ao fim de escassos oito meses de governação, pelo que achou oportuno bajular José Sócrates na hora difícil que este atravessa. Pelos vistos, o número de comunistas autárquicos na Margem Sul aconselha moderação ética a Jerónimo de Sousa, pelo que não resistiu à obrigação patética de sair em defesa de Sócrates, na forma de uma pergunta idiota ao Presidente da República: — Porque dizeis, senhor, que o Freeport é assunto de Estado?! Finalmente, depois de os estrategos do actual Primeiro Ministro terem disseminado eventuais responsabilidades pelas tropelias que envolveram a aprovação do outlet Freeport por vários actores com responsabilidade na consumação dos factos, incluindo Jorge Sampaio e Durão Barroso, damos de caras com a mudez esfíngica de Manuela Ferreira Leite sobre o assunto.

A que é que se deve o silêncio da candidata a próxima primeira-ministra de Portugal?

A minha hipótese, que deriva do facto de o negócio Freeport ter tido eventualmente contornos tipicamente partidários, e não tanto pessoais, é esta: Manuela Ferreira Leite não fala sobre o Freeport, pois sabe que se o seu actual braço direito para os temas organizativos e de angariação de fundos esteve de algum modo envolvido na transmissão de informações entre José Sócrates e Durão Barroso relativamente à consolidação do processo Freeport, tal suspeição arrastaria a actual secretária-geral do PSD (pelo seu estilo e convicção) para uma imediata demissão do cargo.

Ora o facto é que, se não erro, foi mesmo José Luís Arnault quem inaugurou o Freeport, aliás de braço dado ao Príncipe Edward e à condessa de Wessex! E agora?

Se a Freeport pagou avultadas luvas aos intermediários lusitanos do negócio, sobretudo aos intermediários político-partidários, num momento em que já se sabia que o Partido Socialista corria sérios riscos de perder as eleições para o PSD, como é possível imaginar que uma tal eventualidade não tivesse sido acautelada pelos nervosos investidores ingleses?

Esperam-se pois novidades da guerra civil actualmente em curso no interior do Bloco Central.


OAM 532 04-02-2009 01:33

segunda-feira, fevereiro 02, 2009

Crise Global 59

Davos: a nova divisão internacional do trabalho

Enquanto os manifestantes anti-globalização decoravam os noticiários de mais uma cimeira de Davos, e em Portugal um primeiro ministro aldrabão e aparentemente corrupto tem saturado a paisagem mediática local, dois discursos estratégicos de grande importância estão a caminho de mudar profundamente a paisagem económica e política mundial, muito para além do episódio sintomático do abandono dos trabalhos da cimeira por parte do primeiro ministro turco Recep Tayyip Erdogan numa reacção intempestiva ao desfavorecimento do tempo de intervenção que lhe fora concedido relativamente ao homólogo israelita Shimon Peres.

Embora com graus de diplomacia e subtileza retórica diferenciados, Vladimir Putin e Wen Jiabao, fizeram uma análise coincidente sobre as causas da actual crise económico-financeira global: uma América demasiado endividada, consumidora voraz de recursos materiais e financeiros, responsável por um gigantesco esquema Ponzi à escala mundial, e emitente de uma moeda de reserva que perdeu toda a credibilidade. Nas receitas para a crise, China e Rússia formularam ainda ideias semelhantes, que apontam para uma nova e mais justa divisão internacional do trabalho, implicando um acesso mais equilibrado e proporcional de todos os países aos recursos disponíveis, uma nova disciplina financeira mundial, a prioridade da economia real face às economias de casino e o fim do dólar como única moeda de reserva mundial (Wen Jiabao confiou este último recado a Putin...). Ambos os países consideram ainda que o investimento na paz é uma aposta de longo prazo vencedora, ao contrário dos especuladores que insistem nas aventuras militares.

Vale a pena ler integralmente os dois discursos.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao speaks at the World Economic Forum annual meeting, in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 28, 2009. / (Xinhua/Yao Dawei)

Strengthen Confidence and Work Together for A New Round of World Economic Growth

28 January 2009

Professor Klaus Schwab, Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am delighted to be here and address the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2009. Let me begin by thanking Chairman Schwab for his kind invitation and thoughtful arrangements. This annual meeting has a special significance. Amidst a global financial crisis rarely seen in history, it brings together government leaders, business people, experts and scholars of different countries to jointly explore ways to maintain international financial stability, promote world economic growth and better address global issues. Its theme — “Shaping the Post-Crisis World” is highly relevant. It reflects the vision of its organizers. People from across the world are eager to hear words of wisdom from here that will give them strength to tide over the crisis. It is thus our responsibility to send to the world a message of confidence, courage and hope. I look forward to a successful meeting.

The ongoing international financial crisis has landed the world economy in the most difficult situation since last century’s Great Depression. In the face of the crisis, countries and the international community have taken various measures to address it. These measures have played an important role in boosting confidence, reducing the consequences of the crisis, and forestalling a meltdown of the financial system and a deep global recession. This crisis is attributable to a variety of factors and the major ones are: inappropriate macroeconomic policies of some economies and their unsustainable model of development characterized by prolonged low savings and high consumption; excessive expansion of financial institutions in a blind pursuit of profit; lack of self-discipline among financial institutions and rating agencies and the ensuing distortion of risk information and asset pricing; and the failure of financial supervision and regulation to keep up with financial innovations, which allowed the risks of financial derivatives to build and spread. As the saying goes, “A fall in the pit, a gain in your wit,” we must draw lessons from this crisis and address its root causes. In other words, we must strike a balance between savings and consumption, between financial innovation and regulation, and between the financial sector and real economy.

The current crisis has inflicted a rather big impact on China’s economy. We are facing severe challenges, including notably shrinking external demand, overcapacity in some sectors, difficult business conditions for enterprises, rising unemployment in urban areas and greater downward pressure on economic growth.

As a big responsible country, China has acted in an active and responsible way during this crisis. We mainly rely on expanding effective domestic demand, particularly consumer demand, to boost economic growth. [ELAINE: unlike Japan!] We have made timely adjustment to the direction of our macroeconomic policy, swiftly adopted a proactive fiscal policy and a moderately easy monetary policy, introduced ten measures to shore up domestic demand and put in place a series of related policies. Together, they make up a systematic and comprehensive package plan aimed at ensuring steady and relatively fast economic growth.

First, substantially increase government spending and implement a structural tax cut. The Chinese Government has rolled out a two-year program involving a total investment of RMB 4 trillion, equivalent to 16 percent of China’s GDP in 2007. The investment will mainly go to government-subsidized housing projects, projects concerning the well-being of rural residents, railway construction and other infrastructural projects, environmental protection projects and post-earthquake recovery and reconstruction. Some of them are identified as priority projects in China’s 11th Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development. The rest are additional ones to meet the needs of the new situation. This two-year stimulus program has gone through scientific feasibility studies and is supported by a detailed financial arrangement. RMB 1.18 trillion will come from central government’s budget, which is expected to generate funds from local governments and other sources. The Chinese Government has also launched a massive tax cut program which features the comprehensive transformation of the value-added tax, the adoption of preferential tax policies for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and real estate transactions, and the abolition or suspension of 100 items of administrative fees. It is expected to bring about a total saving of RMB 500 billion for businesses and households each year.

Second, frequently cut interest rates and increase liquidity in the banking system. The central bank has cut deposit and lending rates of financial institutions five times in a row, with the one-year benchmark deposit and lending rates down by 1.89 percentage points and 2.16 percentage points respectively. Thus the financial burden of companies has been greatly reduced. The required reserve ratio has been lowered four times, adding up to a total reduction of 2 percentage points for large financial institutions and 4 percentage points for small and medium-sized ones. This has released around RMB 800 billion of liquidity and substantially increased funds available to commercial banks. A series of policy measures have been adopted in the financial sector to boost economic growth, including increasing lending, optimizing the credit structure, and providing greater financial support to agriculture and the SMEs.

Third, implement the industrial restructuring and rejuvenation program on a large scale. We are seizing the opportunity to push ahead comprehensive industrial restructuring and upgrading. To this end, plans are being drawn up for key industries such as automobile and iron and steel, which not only focus on addressing the immediate difficulties of enterprises but also look toward their long-term development. We have taken strong measures to facilitate the merger and reorganization of enterprises, phase out backward production capacity, promote advanced productive forces, and improve industry concentration and the efficiency of resource allocation. We encourage our enterprises to upgrade technologies and make technological renovation. We support them in making extensive use of new technologies, techniques, equipment and materials to restructure their product mix, develop marketable products and improve their competitiveness. Our financial support policies are being improved, a sound credit guarantee system installed and market access eased for the benefit of SME development.

Fourth, actively encourage innovation and upgrading in science and technology. We are speeding up the implementation of the National Program for Medium- and Long-Term Scientific and Technological Development with a special focus on 16 key projects in order to make breakthroughs in core technologies and key generic technologies. This will provide scientific and technological support for China’s sustainable economic development at a higher level. We are developing high-tech industrial clusters and creating new social demand and new economic growth areas. Fifth, substantially raise the level of social security.

We have accelerated the improvement of social safety net. We will continue to increase basic pension for enterprise retirees and upgrade the standard of unemployment insurance and workers’ compensation. We will raise the level of basic cost of living allowances in both urban and rural areas, welfare allowances for those rural residents without family support and the special allowances and assistance to entitled groups. This year, the central budget for social security and employment will increase at a much higher rate than the growth of the overall fiscal revenue.

We are advancing the reform of the medical and health system and working to put in place a nationwide basic medical and health system covering both urban and rural areas within three years and achieve the goal of everyone having access to basic medical and health service. It is estimated that governments at all levels will invest RMB 850 billion for this purpose. We give priority to education and are now working on the Guidelines of the National Program for Medium- and Long-Term Educational Reform and Development.

This year, we will increase public funds for compulsory education in rural areas, offer more financial support to students from poor families and improve the well-being of middle and primary school teachers so as to promote equity in education and optimize the educational structure. We are using every possible means to lessen the impact of the financial crisis on employment.

We are following a more active employment policy. In particular, we have introduced various policy measures to help college graduates and migrant workers find jobs and provided more government-funded jobs in public service. These major policy measures as a whole target both symptoms and root causes, and address both immediate and long-term concerns. They represent a holistic approach and are mutually reinforcing. They are designed to address the need to boost domestic demand, readjust and reinvigorate industries, encourage scientific innovation and strengthen social security. They are designed to stimulate consumption through increased investment, overcome the current difficulties with long-term development in mind, and promote economic growth in the interest of people’s livelihood. These measures can mobilize all resources to meet the current crisis.

China’s economy is in good shape on the whole. We managed to maintain steady and relatively fast economic growth in 2008 despite two unexpected massive natural disasters. Our GDP grew by 9 percent. CPI was basically stable. We had a good grain harvest for the fifth consecutive year, with a total output of 528.5 million tons. Eleven million and one hundred and thirty thousand new jobs were created in cities and towns. Household income in both urban and rural areas continued to rise. The financial system functioned well and the banking system kept its liquidity and credit asset quality at a healthy level. When China, a large developing country, runs its affairs well, it can help restore confidence in global economic growth and curb the spread of the international financial crisis. It will also help increase China’s imports and outbound investment, boost world economic growth and create more development and job opportunities for other countries. Steady and fast growth of China’s economy is in itself an important contribution to global financial stability and world economic growth.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Will China’s economy continue to grow fast and steadily? Some people may have doubts about it. Yet I can give you a definite answer: Yes, it will. We are full of confidence. Where does our confidence come from? It comes from the fact that the fundamentals of China’s economy remain unchanged. Thanks to our right judgment of the situation and prompt and decisive adjustment to our macroeconomic policy, our economy remains on the track of steady and fast development. Our package plan takes into consideration both the need to address current difficulties and that of long-term development. It is beginning to produce results and will be more effective this year. Our confidence comes from the fact that the long-term trend of China’s economic development remains unchanged.

We are in an important period of strategic opportunities and in the process of fast industrialization and urbanization. Infrastructure construction, upgrading of industrial and consumption structures, environmental protection and conservation projects, and various social development programs–all can be translated into huge demand and growth potential and will bolster relatively high-speed growth of our economy for a long time to come. Our confidence also comes from the fact that the advantages contributing to China’s economic growth remain unchanged. With 30 years’ of reform and opening-up, we have laid a good material, technological and institutional foundation.

We have a large well-trained and relatively low-cost labor force. We have a healthy fiscal balance, a sound financial system and adequate funds. Our system enables us to mobilize the necessary resources for big undertakings. There is harmony and stability in our society. What is more important, we follow a scientific approach to development which puts people first and seeks comprehensive, balanced and sustainable development. We are committed to reform, opening-up and win-win progress. We have found the right development path in line with China’s national conditions and the trend of our times. Our people are hard-working, persevering and resilient. It is precisely these fine qualities that endow China, a country with a time-honored history, with greater vitality in the face of adversities.

At the same time, there is no fundamental change in the external environment for China’s economic growth. The pursuit of peace, development and cooperation is the irreversible trend in today’s world. The readjustment to the international division of labor offers new opportunities. We have the confidence, conditions and ability to maintain steady and fast economic growth and continue to contribute to world economic growth.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The global financial crisis is a challenge for the whole world. Confidence, cooperation and responsibility are key to overcoming the crisis. Confidence is the source of strength. The power of confidence is far greater than what can be imagined. The pressing task for the international community and individual countries is to take further measures to restore market confidence as soon as possible. In times of economic hardships, confidence of all countries in the prospect of global economic development, confidence of leaders and people around the world in their countries, confidence of enterprises in investment and confidence of individuals in consumption are more important than anything else. In tackling the crisis, practical cooperation is the effective way. In a world of economic globalization, countries are tied together in their destinies and can hardly be separated from one another. The financial crisis is a test of the readiness of the international community to enhance cooperation, and a test of our wisdom.

Only with closer cooperation and mutual help, can we successfully manage the crisis. To prevail over the crisis, accepting responsibilities is the prerequisite. When governments fulfill their responsibilities with resolution and courage, they can help maintain a stable financial order and prevent the crisis from causing more serious damage on the real economy. Political leaders must be forward-looking. They should be responsible to the entire international community as well as to their own countries and people. It is imperative that we implement the broad agreement reached since the G20 Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy. We should not only take more forceful and effective steps to tide over the current difficulties, but also push for the establishment of a new world economic order that is just, equitable, sound and stable. To this end, I would like to share with you the following ideas.

First, deepen international economic cooperation and promote a sound multilateral trading regime. Past experience shows that in crisis it is all the more important to stick to a policy of opening-up and cooperation. Trade protectionism serves no purpose as it will only worsen and prolong the crisis. It is therefore necessary to move forward trade and investment liberalization and facilitation. China firmly supports efforts to reach balanced results of the Doha Round negotiations at an early date and the establishment of a fair and open multilateral trading regime. As an important supplement to such a trading regime, regional economic integration should be vigorously promoted.

Second, advance the reform of the international financial system and accelerate the establishment of a new international financial order. The current crisis has fully exposed the deficiencies in the existing international financial system and its governance structure. It is important to speed up reform of the governance structures of major international financial institutions, establish a sound global financial rescue mechanism, and enhance capacity in fulfilling responsibilities. Developing countries should have greater say and representation in international financial institutions and their role in maintaining international and regional financial stability should be brought into full play. We should encourage regional monetary and financial cooperation, make good use of regional liquidity assistance mechanisms, and steadily move the international monetary system toward greater diversification.

Third, strengthen international cooperation in financial supervision and regulation and guard against the build-up and spread of financial risks. Financial authorities around the world should step up information sharing and the monitoring of global capital flows to avoid the cross-border transmission of financial risks. We should expand the regulation coverage of the international financial system, with particular emphasis on strengthening the supervision on major reserve currency countries. We should put in place a timely and efficient early warning system against crisis. We should introduce reasonable and effective financial regulatory standards and improve oversight mechanisms in such areas as accounting standards and capital adequacy requirements. We should tighten regulation of financial institutions and intermediaries and enhance transparency of financial markets and products.

Fourth, effectively protect the interests of developing countries and promote economic development of the whole world. The international community, developed countries in particular, should assume due responsibilities and obligations to minimize the damage caused by the international financial crisis on developing countries and help them maintain financial stability and economic growth. International financial institutions should act promptly to assist those developing countries in need through such measures as relaxing lending conditions. We should advance the international poverty reduction process and scale up assistance to the least developed countries and regions in particular with a view to building up their capacity for independent development.

Fifth, jointly tackle global challenges and build a better home for mankind. Issues such as climate change, environmental degradation, diseases, natural disasters, energy, resources and food security as well as the spread of terrorism bear on the very survival and development of mankind. No country can be insulated from these challenges or meet them on its own. The international community should intensify cooperation and respond to these challenges together.

I want to reaffirm here China’s abiding commitment to peaceful, open and cooperative development. China is ready to work with other members of the international community to maintain international financial stability, promote world economic growth, tackle various global risks and challenges, and contribute its share to world harmony and sustainable development.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The harsh winter will be gone and spring is around the corner. Let us strengthen confidence and work closely together to bring about a new round of world economic growth.

Thank you.
__________________
长期征婚,

征到为止。



Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s speech at the opening ceremony of the World Economic Forum

Davos, Switzerland January 28, 2009


Good afternoon, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen,

I would like to thank the forum’s organisers for this opportunity to share my thoughts on global economic developments and to share our plans and proposals. The world is now facing the first truly global economic crisis, which is continuing to develop at an unprecedented pace.

The current situation is often compared to the Great Depression of the late 1920s and the early 1930s. True, there are some similarities.

However, there are also some basic differences. The crisis has affected everyone at this time of globalisation. Regardless of their political or economic system, all nations have found themselves in the same boat.

There is a certain concept, called the perfect storm, which denotes a situation when Nature’s forces converge in one point of the ocean and increase their destructive potential many times over. It appears that the present-day crisis resembles such a perfect storm.

Responsible and knowledgeable people must prepare for it. Nevertheless, it always flares up unexpectedly.

The current situation is no exception either. Although the crisis was simply hanging in the air, the majority strove to get their share of the pie, be it one dollar or a billion, and did not want to notice the rising wave. In the last few months, virtually every speech on this subject started with criticism of the United States. But I will do nothing of the kind.

I just want to remind you that, just a year ago, American delegates speaking from this rostrum emphasised the US economy’s fundamental stability and its cloudless prospects. Today, investment banks, the pride of Wall Street, have virtually ceased to exist. In just 12 months, they have posted losses exceeding the profits they made in the last 25 years. This example alone reflects the real situation better than any criticism.

The time for enlightenment has come. We must calmly, and without gloating, assess the root causes of this situation and try to peek into the future. In our opinion, the crisis was brought about by a combination of several factors.

The existing financial system has failed. Substandard regulation has contributed to the crisis, failing to duly heed tremendous risks.

Add to this colossal disproportions that have accumulated over the last few years. This primarily concerns disproportions between the scale of financial operations and the fundamental value of assets, as well as those between the increased burden on international loans and the sources of their collateral.

The entire economic growth system, where one regional centre prints money without respite and consumes material wealth, while another regional centre manufactures inexpensive goods and saves money printed by other governments, has suffered a major setback.

I would like to add that this system has left entire regions, including Europe, on the outskirts of global economic processes and has prevented them from adopting key economic and financial decisions.

Moreover, generated prosperity was distributed extremely unevenly among various population strata. This applies to differences between social strata in certain countries, including highly developed ones. And it equally applies to gaps between countries and regions.

A considerable share of the world’s population still cannot afford comfortable housing, education and quality health care. Even a global recovery posted in the last few years has failed to radically change this situation.

And, finally, this crisis was brought about by excessive expectations. Corporate appetites with regard to constantly growing demand swelled unjustifiably. The race between stock market indices and capitalisation began to overshadow rising labour productivity and real-life corporate effectiveness.

Unfortunately, excessive expectations were not only typical of the business community. They set the pace for rapidly growing personal consumption standards, primarily in the industrial world. We must openly admit that such growth was not backed by a real potential. This amounted to unearned wealth, a loan that will have to be repaid by future generations. This pyramid of expectations would have collapsed sooner or later. In fact, this is happening right before our eyes.

* * *

Esteemed colleagues,

One is sorely tempted to make simple and popular decisions in times of crisis. However, we could face far greater complications if we merely treat the symptoms of the disease.

Naturally, all national governments and business leaders must take resolute actions. Nevertheless, it is important to avoid making decisions, even in such force majeure circumstances, that we will regret in the future.

This is why I would first like to mention specific measures which should be avoided and which will not be implemented by Russia.

We must not revert to isolationism and unrestrained economic egotism. The leaders of the world’s largest economies agreed during the November 2008 G20 summit not to create barriers hindering global trade and capital flows. Russia shares these principles.

Although additional protectionism will prove inevitable during the crisis, all of us must display a sense of proportion.

Excessive intervention in economic activity and blind faith in the state’s omnipotence is another possible mistake.

True, the state’s increased role in times of crisis is a natural reaction to market setbacks. Instead of streamlining market mechanisms, some are tempted to expand state economic intervention to the greatest possible extent.

The concentration of surplus assets in the hands of the state is a negative aspect of anti-crisis measures in virtually every nation.

In the 20th century, the Soviet Union made the state’s role absolute. In the long run, this made the Soviet economy totally uncompetitive. This lesson cost us dearly. I am sure nobody wants to see it repeated.

Nor should we turn a blind eye to the fact that the spirit of free enterprise, including the principle of personal responsibility of businesspeople, investors and shareholders for their decisions, is being eroded in the last few months. There is no reason to believe that we can achieve better results by shifting responsibility onto the state.

And one more point: anti-crisis measures should not escalate into financial populism and a refusal to implement responsible macroeconomic policies. The unjustified swelling of the budgetary deficit and the accumulation of public debts are just as destructive as adventurous stock-jobbing.

* * *

Ladies and gentlemen,

Unfortunately, we have so far failed to comprehend the true scale of the ongoing crisis. But one thing is obvious: the extent of the recession and its scale will largely depend on specific high-precision measures, due to be charted by governments and business communities and on our coordinated and professional efforts.

In our opinion, we must first atone for the past and open our cards, so to speak. This means we must assess the real situation and write off all hopeless debts and “bad” assets.

True, this will be an extremely painful and unpleasant process. Far from everyone can accept such measures, fearing for their capitalisation, bonuses or reputation. However, we would “conserve” and prolong the crisis, unless we clean up our balance sheets. I believe financial authorities must work out the required mechanism for writing off debts that corresponds to today’s needs.

Second. Apart from cleaning up our balance sheets, it is high time we got rid of virtual money, exaggerated reports and dubious ratings. We must not harbour any illusions while assessing the state of the global economy and the real corporate standing, even if such assessments are made by major auditors and analysts. In effect, our proposal implies that the audit, accounting and ratings system reform must be based on a reversion to the fundamental asset value concept. In other words, assessments of each individual business must be based on its ability to generate added value, rather than on subjective concepts. In our opinion, the economy of the future must become an economy of real values. How to achieve this is not so clear-cut. Let us think about it together.

Third. Excessive dependence on a single reserve currency is dangerous for the global economy. Consequently, it would be sensible to encourage the objective process of creating several strong reserve currencies in the future. It is high time we launched a detailed discussion of methods to facilitate a smooth and irreversible switchover to the new model.

Fourth. Most nations convert their international reserves into foreign currencies and must therefore be convinced that they are reliable. Those issuing reserve and accounting currencies are objectively interested in their use by other states.

This highlights mutual interests and interdependence.

Consequently, it is important that reserve currency issuers must implement more open monetary policies. Moreover, these nations must pledge to abide by internationally recognised rules of macroeconomic and financial discipline. In our opinion, this demand is not excessive.

At the same time, the global financial system is not the only element in need of reforms. We are facing a much broader range of problems.

This means that a system based on cooperation between several major centres must replace the obsolete unipolar world concept.

We must strengthen the system of global regulators based on international law and a system of multilateral agreements in order to prevent chaos and unpredictability in such a multipolar world. Consequently, it is very important that we reassess the role of leading international organisations and institutions. I am convinced that we can build a more equitable and efficient global economic system. But it is impossible to create a detailed plan at this event today.

It is clear, however, that every nation must have guaranteed access to vital resources, new technology and development sources. What we need is guarantees that could minimise risks of recurring crises.

Naturally, we must continue to discuss all these issues, including at the G20 meeting in London, which will take place in April.

* * *

Our decisions should match the present-day situation and heed the requirements of a new post-crisis world.

The global economy could face trite energy-resource shortages and the threat of thwarted future growth while overcoming the crisis.

Three years ago, at a summit of the Group of Eight, we raised the issue of global energy security. We called for the shared responsibility of suppliers, consumers and transit countries. I think it is time to launch truly effective mechanisms ensuring such responsibility.

The only way to ensure truly global energy security is to form interdependence, including a swap of assets, without any discrimination or dual standards. It is such interdependence that generates real mutual responsibility.

Unfortunately, the existing Energy Charter has failed to become a working instrument able to regulate emerging problems.

I propose we start laying down a new international legal framework for energy security. Implementation of our initiative could play a political role comparable to the treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community. That is to say, consumers and producers would finally be bound into a real single energy partnership based on clear-cut legal foundations.

Every one of us realises that sharp and unpredictable fluctuations of energy prices are a colossal destabilising factor in the global economy. Today’s landslide fall of prices will lead to a growth in the consumption of resources.

On the one hand, investments in energy saving and alternative sources of energy will be curtailed. On the other, less money will be invested in oil production, which will result in its inevitable downturn. Which, in the final analysis, will escalate into another fit of uncontrolled price growth and a new crisis.

It is necessary to return to a balanced price based on an equilibrium between supply and demand, to strip pricing of a speculative element generated by many derivative financial instruments.

To guarantee the transit of energy resources remains a challenge. There are two ways of tackling it, and both must be used.

The first is to go over to generally recognised market principles of fixing tariffs on transit services. They can be recorded in international legal documents.

The second is to develop and diversify the routes of energy transportation. We have been working long and hard along these lines.

In the past few years alone, we have implemented such projects as the Yamal- Europe and Blue Stream gas pipelines. Experience has proved their urgency and relevance.

I am convinced that such projects as South Stream and North Stream are equally needed for Europe’s energy security. Their total estimated capacity is something like 85 billion cubic meters of gas a year.

Gazprom, together with its partners – Shell, Mitsui and Mitsubishi – will soon launch capacities for liquefying and transporting natural gas produced in the Sakhalin area. And that is also Russia’s contribution to global energy security.

We are developing the infrastructure of our oil pipelines. The first section of the Baltic Pipeline System (BPS) has already been completed. BPS-1 supplies up to 75 million tonnes of oil a year. It does this direct to consumers – via our ports on the Baltic Sea. Transit risks are completely eliminated in this way. Work is currently under way to design and build BPS-2 (its throughput capacity is 50 million tonnes of oil a year.

We intend to build transport infrastructure in all directions. The first stage of the pipeline system Eastern Siberia – Pacific Ocean is in the final stage. Its terminal point will be a new oil port in Kozmina Bay and an oil refinery in the Vladivostok area. In the future a gas pipeline will be laid parallel to the oil pipeline, towards the Pacific and China.

* * *

Addressing you here today, I cannot but mention the effects of the global crisis on the Russian economy. We have also been seriously affected.

However, unlike many other countries, we have accumulated large reserves. They expand our possibilities for confidently passing through the period of global instability.

The crisis has made the problems we had more evident. They concern the excessive emphasis on raw materials in exports and the economy in general and a weak financial market. The need to develop a number of fundamental market institutions, above all of a competitive environment, has become more acute.

We were aware of these problems and sought to address them gradually. The crisis is only making us move more actively towards the declared priorities, without changing the strategy itself, which is to effect a qualitative renewal of Russia in the next 10 to 12 years.

Our anti-crisis policy is aimed at supporting domestic demand, providing social guarantees for the population, and creating new jobs. Like many countries, we have reduced production taxes, leaving money in the economy. We have optimised state spending.

But, I repeat, along with measures of prompt response, we are also working to create a platform for post-crisis development.

We are convinced that those who will create attractive conditions for global investment already now and will be able to preserve and strengthen sources of strategically meaningful resources will become leaders of the restoration of the global economy.

This is why among our priorities we have the creation of a favourable business environment and development of competition; the establishment of a stable loan system resting on sufficient internal resources; and implementation of transport and other infrastructure projects.

Russia is already one of the major exporters of a number of food commodities. And our contribution to ensuring global food security will only increase.

We are also going to actively develop the innovation sectors of the economy. Above all, those in which Russia has a competitive edge – space, nuclear energy, aviation. In these areas, we are already actively establishing cooperative ties with other countries. A promising area for joint efforts could be the sphere of energy saving. We see higher energy efficiency as one of the key factors for energy security and future development.

We will continue reforms in our energy industry. Adoption of a new system of internal pricing based on economically justified tariffs. This is important, including for encouraging energy saving. We will continue our policy of openness to foreign investments.

I believe that the 21st century economy is an economy of people not of factories. The intellectual factor has become increasingly important in the economy. That is why we are planning to focus on providing additional opportunities for people to realise their potential.

We are already a highly educated nation. But we need for Russian citizens to obtain the highest quality and most up-to-date education, and such professional skills that will be widely in demand in today’s world. Therefore, we will be pro- active in promoting educational programmes in leading specialities.

We will expand student exchange programmes, arrange training for our students at the leading foreign colleges and universities and with the most advanced companies. We will also create such conditions that the best researchers and professors – regardless of their citizenship – will want to come and work in Russia.

History has given Russia a unique chance. Events urgently require that we reorganise our economy and update our social sphere. We do not intend to pass up this chance. Our country must emerge from the crisis renewed, stronger and more competitive.

* * *

Separately, I would like to comment on problems that go beyond the purely economic agenda, but nevertheless are very topical in present-day conditions.

Unfortunately, we are increasingly hearing the argument that the build-up of military spending could solve today’s social and economic problems. The logic is simple enough. Additional military allocations create new jobs.

At a glance, this sounds like a good way of fighting the crisis and unemployment. This policy might even be quite effective in the short term. But in the longer run, militarisation won’t solve the problem but will rather quell it temporarily. What it will do is squeeze huge financial and other resources from the economy instead of finding better and wiser uses for them.

My conviction is that reasonable restraint in military spending, especially coupled with efforts to enhance global stability and security, will certainly bring significant economic dividends.

I hope that this viewpoint will eventually dominate globally. On our part, we are geared to intensive work on discussing further disarmament.

I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the economic crisis could aggravate the current negative trends in global politics.

The world has lately come to face an unheard-of surge of violence and other aggressive actions, such as Georgia’s adventurous sortie in the Caucasus, recent terrorist attacks in India, and escalation of violence in Gaza Strip. Although not apparently linked directly, these developments still have common features.

First of all, I am referring to the existing international organisations’ inability to provide any constructive solutions to regional conflicts, or any effective proposals for interethnic and interstate settlement. Multilateral political mechanisms have proved as ineffective as global financial and economic regulators.

Frankly speaking, we all know that provoking military and political instability, regional and other conflicts is a helpful means of distracting the public from growing social and economic problems. Such attempts cannot be ruled out, unfortunately.

To prevent this scenario, we need to improve the system of international relations, making it more effective, safe and stable.

There are a lot of important issues on the global agenda in which most countries have shared interests. These include anti-crisis policies, joint efforts to reform international financial institutions, to improve regulatory mechanisms, ensure energy security and mitigate the global food crisis, which is an extremely pressing issue today.

Russia is willing to contribute to dealing with international priority issues. We expect all our partners in Europe, Asia and America, including the new US administration, to show interest in further constructive cooperation in dealing with all these issues and more. We wish the new team success.

* * *

Ladies and gentlemen, The international community is facing a host of extremely complicated problems, which might seem overpowering at times. But, a journey of thousand miles begins with a single step, as the proverb goes.

We must seek foothold relying on the moral values that have ensured the progress of our civilisation. Integrity and hard work, responsibility and self-confidence will eventually lead us to success.

We should not despair. This crisis can and must be fought, also by pooling our intellectual, moral and material resources.

This kind of consolidation of effort is impossible without mutual trust, not only between business operators, but primarily between nations.

Therefore, finding this mutual trust is a key goal we should concentrate on now.

Trust and solidarity are key to overcoming the current problems and avoiding more shocks, to reaching prosperity and welfare in this new century.

Thank you.

OAM 531 01-02-2009 01:29