The World Bank at a time when according to the IMF, the MENA region is on track for a recovery, despite some rising social unrest threatening the ‘fragile’ progress of low-income economies, produced the following enthusiastic remarks by World Bank Group President David Malpass address to the Arab Governors of the World Bank Group.
Remarks by World Bank Group President David Malpass to the Arab Governors of the World Bank Group
Let me begin by congratulating Minister Khalil. Your appointment as Minister of Finance comes at a crucial moment in Lebanon’s history. The World Bank Group will work with you to support the critical reforms needed to address Lebanon’s challenges. Thank you for mentioning Hela in your opening. She’s the new IFC Vice President for the region, and I want you all to know the high priority we place on private sector advancement in the region. All parts of the World Bank Group are making that a high priority.
Dear Governors and distinguished guests, it is a pleasure to be with you again to discuss the challenges and opportunities in your region. Thank you for your recent annual letter outlining the key and urgent development challenges of the region. Let me also thank our Dean Dr Merza Hassan for helping to convene this meeting and for his unwavering support to the MENA region.
We meet today against a backdrop of uncertainty. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to reversals in development gains in many regions, threatening jobs, social stability – and lives.
MENA was hit particularly hard by Covid 19. Even before the pandemic, growth had stalled, poverty was on the rise, and the social contract between citizens and the state was strained. Climate change adds a further burden to the development challenge.
During my recent visits to the region, to Sudan, Jordan and the Palestinian territories, I saw firsthand the impact of this multi-pronged crisis. I was concerned by low investment levels, high unemployment rates, and low female labor participation rates.
I also saw potential via regional integration, pro-growth investment, and improvements in the enabling environment for business. The recovery in global growth provides opportunities to make positive changes, and I was encouraged by my discussions with officials and businesses.
As you know, MENA is the least economically integrated region in the world. We have expressed our support for any initiative aimed at developing economic ties between countries in the region, and we are thus looking at ways to support the gas and electricity potential connection between Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon.
While we are not in a position to engage in Syria, we nevertheless are concerned about the Syrian people’s economic woes due to the degradation of the situation in the country. Our position has always been to look after the people, and we are doing so for Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Jordan.
In the year leading up to the next annual meetings in Marrakesh, my message will remain focused on the importance of improving access to vaccines; recovering from Covid; overcoming conflict; mitigating and adapting to climate change; containing debt; and creating strong sustainable jobs for the youth of this region.
Morocco has made progress on all of these, and I want to thank you for graciously hosting us in 2022.
As a region, MENA will need to generate 300 million new jobs by 2050. These will be created largely by the private – not public – sector. Reaching this critical goal of sustainable job creation needs governance and transparency, rule of law, and an attractive business environment.
IBRD, IFC and MIGA are fully engaged. I’m interested in hearing from you where the World Bank Group can position itself better.
As we move toward Marrakesh in 2022 and Cop27 in Egypt, how can the Bank Group assist in making these events a launching pad for more sustained and comprehensive development in MENA?
Thank you again for inviting me and let’s now open our discussion.
Conditions for boosting the privatisation process via the Algiers Stock Exchange are reviewed by University professor and international expert, Dr Abderrahmane MEBTOUL.
The aims of the privatisation, whether partial or total of the Algerian economy do not come to be questioned. The process is a must, however, it needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency. Proposals of strategies are made, notably through my experience as Chairman of the National Council of Privatizations between 1996/1999 complemented by numerous tours in the USA, helping to formulate the conditions for the success of the privatisation process via the Algiers Stock Exchange, to imply clarity in the objectives and means of implementation.
The Algerian Stock market in Algeria. (Photo by Monique Jaques/Corbis via Getty Images)
The urgency of a strategic vision
At a time of the coronavirus pandemic and the world going through new socio-economic changes in technological and organisational models including shock waves that according to the IMF, the World Bank, and the OECD, global growth will not be felt before the end of 2021. Furthermore, subject to the control of the epidemic, all domestic companies using the State’s handouts for their survival and all of the state-owned enterprises suffer from a structural deficit. Indebted to banks, some whose production techniques, are obsolete and do not meet new technologies and international standards, it is mentioned in this particular context to address the large budget deficit. The observation is the lack of dynamism of the public sector, the consolidation supported by the public treasury having far exceeded 100 billion dollars at constant prices between 2000/2020. The cost of the numerous restructurings between 1980/1999 and the ensuing remediation period of 2000/2020, resulted in more than 95% of the domestic companies returned to their inception status. Whereas with this, capital-money, it would have been more sensible to create a whole new and performing economic fabric. These are only announcements because, being an eminently political process, any decision on such a sensitive and complicated subject must first have the approval of the Council of Ministers certainly after consultation with the Security Council because it commits national security. Privatisation should not be confused with complementary de-monopolisation, both eminently political, moving towards the disengagement of the State from the economic sphere so that it devotes itself to its role as a strategic regulator in a market economy. Privatisation is a transfer of ownership from existing units to the private sector, and de-monopolisation is about fostering new private investment. The objective of de-monopolisation and privatisation must reinforce the systemic transformation of the transition from an administered economy to a competitive market economy. A legal text is not enough (this is only a means) and becomes a decoy if there are no coherent objectives clearly defined with pragmatism and a return to trust.
Privatisation can only be successful if it is part of a coherent and visible global socio-economic policy and if it is accompanied by a competitive universal and sustained dialogue between the social partners. It should be aimed at putting an end to perpetual legal instability. The renovation of the Ministry of Finance through digitisation of all systems of taxation, banks, land and customs duties would surely put an end to the central and local bureaucracy that as a significant constraint of an administered economy would be best be accompanied by the overhaul of the socio-political system. Also, the decentralisation around large four to five regional poles, not deconcentration would help.
Moreover, the impacts of all trade agreements between Algeria and the European Union, Africa and the Arab world, as well as all international ones would be of a win-win type only if Algeria has public or private companies that are competitive in terms of cost/quality. In any case, all of these agreements have domestically economic, social and political implications.
The four conditions for boosting the privatisation process
Are our managers aware that there is a global privatisation market where competition is perennial, and the determining factor is a demand for goodwill and not just supply? The success of this process to prevent certain predators from being interested only in the real estate of these companies and not in the production tool involving five conditions?
The first condition, its impact on the reduction of the budget deficit where according to the Finance Law of 2021 more than $21.75 billion in 2021, against the 2020 close of $18.60 billion and an overall projected treasury deficit of $28.26 billion, artificially, which is in principle filled by higher production and domestic productivity; to boost non-hydrocarbon exports and contribute to the establishment of a competitive market economy far from any monopoly, whether public or private.
The State, as a regulator and guarantor of social cohesion, especially at a time of budgetary and tensions domestic and at our borders should enforce the contract between employers and employees so that the logic of profit does not undermine the dignity of workers. Nevertheless, never forget that the most incredible moral devaluation in any society is being unemployed or assisted. The important thing is not to work in the national, international or state-private sector, the critical thing for our children is to find a sustainable job within the framework of social protection.
The second condition was a good preparation of a company X for privatisation, assuming transparent communication, as some executives and workers had heard the news in the press, which increased social tensions. Transparency is a fundamental condition for the acceptance of both the population and workers in the spirit of reforms linked to profound democratisation of society. The takeover of companies for executives and workers requires the creation of a risk bank to accompany them because they possess the technological, organisational and commercial know-how a hardcore of skills must constitute the basis of any reliable unit.
The third condition will be to avoid filialisations that were not operating in the past—sticking with bureaucratic power, being the basis for the success of both the partial opening of capital and total privatisation, the wealth in the accounts being often undefining. Lack of an updated land registry poses the problem of the non-existence of reliable title deeds without which no transfer of ownership can be carried out. As there is an urgent need to have transparent real-time accountings of public, private companies, that meet international standards, all measures will be ineffective especially for stock market valuation the actual sale price varies from time to time.
The fourth condition, time overlap of different institutions between selection, evaluations, tender notices, transfer to the stakeholders, then to the Government for the issuance of the final title of ownership would best be not arduous. It may discourage any takeover because mobile capital is invested only where economic and political obstacles are minimal. In this context, it is imperative that long bureaucratic circuits avoid a clearly defined synchronisation and that the current conflicting legal texts should be reviewed, which can lead to endless conflicts, hence the urgent need for their harmonisation with international law. Empowerment will need to be specified where it is necessary to determine who has it to request the undertaking of a privatisation operation. It is vital to prepare the transaction, to organise the selection of the purchaser, to authorise the conclusion of the transaction, to sign the relevant agreements and finally, to ensure that they are carried out correctly.
The four conditions for boosting the Algiers Stock Exchange
In lethargy since its inception, the ASE was built up like a stadium without players through administrative injunctions, like all the loss-making state-owned enterprises.
However, the revitalisation of the stock market implies three conditions.
First, the lifting of environmental constraints gives bureaucratic obstacles that cannot be a reliable purse without competition, avoiding legal instability referring to the rule of law.
Second, a stock exchange must be based on a renovated banking system. However, the Algerian financial system for decades has been the place par excellence for the distribution of the hydrocarbon rent and therefore a considerable challenge of power, and therefore the revitalisation of the stock market necessarily requires the overhaul of the financial system. Indeed, despite the number of private operators, we have a public economy with managed management, all activities whatever their nature feeding on budget flows, i.e. the very essence of financing is linked to the actual or supposed capacity of treasure. It can be considered that the banks in Algeria operate not from local market savings but by the recurrent advances from the Central Bank of Algeria that is refinanced by the public treasury in the form of reorganisation not only for the recent period but having to count the costs of restructuring between 1980/1990. This transformation is not in the scope of the company. However, it moves into the institutional field (distribution of the annuity hydrocarbons), and in this relationship, the Algerian financial system is passive. Bread 90% of these companies its returned to the starting box showing that it is not a question of capital money, real wealth can only assume the transformation of currency stock into capital stock, and there is the whole development problem.
Thirdly, there can be no stock exchange without the resolution of all deeds circulating shares or bonds. The urgency of the integration of the informal sphere cannot be underestimated. Issuing title deeds is vital as there can be no reliable stock exchange without clear and transparent accounting modelled on international standards by generalising audits and analytical accounting in order to determine the cost centres for shareholders. This raises the problem of adapting a socio-educational system, which does not exist as financial engineering. The balance-of-payments services item with foreign exchange outflows between 2010/2019 is between $9/11 billion per year, in addition to foreign exchange outflows from import goods. There are a few rare exceptions; it turns out that accounts Algerian public and private companies from the most important to the simplest in the State that would not pass the most basic audits due diligence. For example, SONATRACH needs new strategic management like the majority of Algerian companies, with clear accounts in order to determine costs by sections, where we are witnessing the opacity of its management which is limited to delivering consolidated global accounts covering the essentials without distinguishing whether the surplus accumulated is due to exogenous factors, international prices or good internal management. As a primer, we propose partial privatisation of a few profitable national champions to initiate the movement to enable the establishment of a stock market index consisting of volume and quality, acting as incubators of companies eligible for the stock exchange and attracting investors looking for financing and know-how.
The fourth condition is monetary stability and legal and monetary stability and the resolution of bad debts and debts, with state-owned banks crumbling under the weight of bad debts and the majority of state-owned enterprises in structural deficits, especially for the currency-denominated part involving transparent mechanisms in the event of exchange rate fluctuations. The simultaneous depreciation of the dinar against the Dollar, the main currency of exchange, does not respond to real values because their quotations are inversely proportional, has the essential aim of artificially filling the budget deficit, akin to an indirect tax. Indeed, on October 15, 2020, on the Stock Exchange, the Dollar is quoted at 1.2144 Euro, against 1.16 in June 2020, a depreciation of 5%, allowing a rise in the price of Brent by 5%. In reference to the June 2020 quote, the price of Brent quoted on December 15 at $50 would be $47.5 at constant prices, thus not having experienced a real increase in terms of purchasing power parity against the Euro and thus an increase in the import bill in euros in the same proportions. Thus, the current Government projecting for 2023 about 185 Dinar one Euro and 156 Dinars per Dollar and taking a 50% deviation from the parallel market we will have about 300 Dinars a minimum Euro in 2023 subject to the control of inflation otherwise the gap would be larger. They were compared to more than 200 Dinars in mid-December 2020 with a projection of 240/250 Euros at the end of 2021 in as to open borders and the inevitable increase in interest rates of the banks’ priorities to avoid their bankruptcies. In this case, it is illusory both to attract the savings of emigration via the banks that one wants to install with foreign exchange costs, as to capture the money capital via the informal sphere via Islamic finance. How do you want a trader with this monetary instability to appear on the stock exchange knowing that the value of the dinar will fall by at least 30% if not more in two to three years, depreciating its assets?.
In summary
The partial or total privatisation can be the process, with economic, social and political recompositions of power for a controlled liberalisation in order to avoid the squandering of public assets for the benefit of speculators interested mainly in real estate assets. It involves the transparency of specific objectives, the removal of bureaucratic obstacles, land, banks, the informal sphere, taxation, legal and monetary stability, essential criteria for any national investor.
Kirk H. Sowell describes in Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, how a newly appointed government finds it challenging to make ends meet through Iraq’s Dire Fiscal Crisis. In effect, like most oil-exporting countries of the MENA region, Iraq has to come to terms with the changing fundamentals of the world economy as aggravated by the pandemic.
Iraq’s Dire Fiscal Crisis
2 November 2020
Iraq’s Prime Minister inherited a series of fiscal crises. As his interim government struggles to avert a complete economic collapse, austerity measures may come at the expense of much-needed reforms.
Since taking office, Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi has faced a series of fiscal and security crises amid collapsing public services and protests. The collapse in global oil prices due to the coronavirus pandemic and the Saudi-Russia oil price war caused Iraq to face an internal solvency crisis as early as June. This fiscal crisis has short and long-term implications. In the short-term, Baghdad continuously struggles to pay public sector salaries, which required the state to borrow from the Central Bank over the summer. With low oil revenue, the state’s monthly profits are covering just over 50 percent of its expenses. In the longer-term, Iraq faces a looming macro-fiscal state collapse—potentially within the next year.
The state is struggling to cover its monthly expenses. Over successive governments, the size of the public sector has grown to the point that Iraq needs to spend more than its total revenue on basic payments—public sector salaries, pensions, food aid, and welfare—to keep a majority of Iraq’s population out of destitution. In 2019, oil revenue averaged $6.5 million per month, and with modest non-oil revenues (largely customs, well less than $1 billion per month), this covered operational expenses with a small amount left over for capital spending. Since the recovery of oil prices after the March collapse, Iraq’s monthly oil revenues have averaged just over $3 billion/month, hitting a high of $3.52 billion in August. In testimony before parliament in September, Finance Minister Ali Allawi revealed[1] that with revenues at these levels, the government was still borrowing 3.5 trillion Iraqi Dinars (IQD) — just over $3 billion—from the Central Bank each month.
On October 10, as Iraq’s cash crunch became more acute, Allawi explained that state employee compensation rose from 20 percent of oil revenues in 2005 to 120 percent today. To help the public understand why the government of such an oil-rich country was broke, he explained that a government of this size should have at least $15 to 20 billion in funds to pay monthly expenses on an ongoing basis, but when this government took office, only about $1 billion was available.[2] This is in part due to weak revenues, the result of low oil prices and Iraq’s adherence to OPEC’s limitations on oil exports. In the past, Iraq’s oil exports have reached 3.5 million barrels per day (bpd), yet they decreased to 2.5 million bpd in recent months. Prominent figures, including former oil minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum, have argued in favor of leaving the OPEC agreement unilaterally. Yet Allawi, speaking before Parliament, explained that while he agreed that OPEC’s quota formula was unfair, Iraq needs the OPEC agreement to keep oil prices from collapsing. More recently, according to the Iraq Oil Report, the government has signaled that it may try to thread the needle by increasing exports by 250,000 barrels per day to satisfy critics—an amount above its quota, but still about 750,000 barrels per day below peak production, and thus hopefully too small an increase to incur Saudi retaliation.
Iraq’s monthly oil revenue to collapsed from $6.2 billion in January to just $1.4 billion in April. The figure recovered to $2.9 billion in May and has gradually improved since, but in August was still just $3.5 billion. Since the government only had about $3 billion in expendable reserves in May, it became clear that Iraq could not pay state employees in June. Salaries over the summer were paid as money became available. As late as July 28, the prime minister’s spokesman admitted that employees at the Culture & Antiquities Ministry (apparently the lowest priority), were still waiting to be paid.
The government saw this crisis coming and began preparing the public for austerity. Finance Minister Allawi made multiple public appearances, describing Iraq’s situation as dire and arguing for radical reform. In particular, he predicted that the government, while protecting base salaries, would make large cuts to employee benefits and other costs. On June 9, the cabinet followed through when it voted to implement a series of austerity measures, including cutting benefits, cutting unessential spending, and capping income from “double-salary” payments.[3] Kadhimi’s advisor Hisham Daoud described the new policies as “not enough but only a start” toward reform.
Kadhimi, with no electoral base or political base of his own, has faced the fiscal crisis with a weak hand. This became clear when Parliament overwhelmingly rejected the government’s austerity policies on June 10, one day later. Even MPs friendly to the government described the government’s measures as premature, suggesting that they should try to raise revenue through customs first. Parliament eventually passed a borrowing law on June 24 to allow the government to borrow just enough to make basic payments. This law, however, prohibited the government from cutting benefits. Previously, the cabinet had the authority to cut benefits because, unlike salaries set by law, benefits were set by previous cabinet decrees. Thus, Parliament made the long-term problem worse.
In July, protests resurged in Baghdad as a result of the fiscal crisis. The shortage of money caused Iraq’s electricity shortage to worsen dramatically. Outgoing Electricity Minister Luay al-Khatteeb attributed the decline to two factors: lack of maintenance and the suspension of planned electricity projects.
The government has a few possible, but politically difficult, fixes at its disposal. They could cut the subsidy of roughly $1 billion per month to private electricity consumption, which exists because the ministry only collects a fraction of consumer payments. Finance Minister Allawi pointed out that “people don’t pay their electricity bills” and that “95 percent” of consumption costs was absorbed by the state, asserting that “electricity is not a constitutional right.”[4] Yet such an effort will recall former prime minister Haider al-Abadi’s experience trying to extract electricity payments in 2017, which precipitated a strong protest movement. So far, Kadhimi has shown no sign of pushing the issue. His published comments during a cabinet meeting devoted to the electricity issue focused on “reducing bureaucracy” and improving maintenance, sidestepping the fact that maintenance workers have to be paid.
Iraq’s fiscal crisis comes on the heels of the political crisis of the outgoing government, which left the country without a budget for most of 2020. In such cases, Iraqi law allows the government to spend one twelfth of the previous year’s actual spending each month. Since this year’s revenues have been low, it never had the money to spend that much and simply spent what it had on basic payments. In September, the government released a budget for 2020 and the planned deficit was large—well over 100 percent—so as with past budgets much of the deficit will likely not be spent. The total anticipated revenues are 67.4 trillion dinars, or $57 billion, compared with proposed expenditures of 148.6 trillion dinars, or $125.7 billion. Oil revenue in 2019 was $78.5 billion yet is projected to be just $49.3 billion for 2020. The government withdrew the bill just two days after it arrived in parliament.
In September the government ran out of money, having used up the borrowing authority from the June bill.[5] Given the population’s overwhelming dependence on state salaries, this brought the short-term financial problems to the fore. Furthermore, Parliament refused to authorize the new borrowing authority Allawi sought because the government had not submitted a “reform plan.” Thus in early October the government released a “White Paper” reform plan. The plan draws a broad and long path to reform that does not directly address the immediate crisis, except to the extent that its publication formally satisfies Parliament’s precondition for new borrowing.
An important part of Allawi’s efforts was his advocacy of Iraq accepting an International Monetary Fund “Stand-By Agreement” (SBA) which might be the only way to prevent a fiscal collapse next year. The agreement would also require spending cuts that parliament has already rejected. Allawi stressed that the IMF would not require cuts to programs protecting the poor, but rather to public sector compensation that, in Allawi’s view, Iraq needed to cut anyway.[6]
This set the stage for a new debacle as the government then sent a new borrowing law to Parliament only to condemn it. A member of Parliament on the Finance Committee criticized the figures in the bill as irresponsible.[7] Given the parliament’s role in aggravating the crisis, this was grandstanding. The looming parliamentary elections, due no later than 2022 and possibly earlier, are driving the political theater. Parliament will presumably pass an amended version of the government’s borrowing bill to allow the government to pay salaries. In the meantime, with salaries being paid late, disposable income is squeezed, further damaging an already weak economy. But Iraq could face a much worse scenario in 2021, as the IMF’s updated forecast for Brent oil prices projects $46.70 per barrel. Iraq’s Central Bank, which rescued the government over the summer, relies on a steady flow of dollars from oil revenues and given current prices range from $40 to $45, reserves are gradually declining. According to financial analyst Ahmed al-Tabaqchali, at current oil prices the Central Bank can continue to print money to fund the government “for about eight or nine months.”[8]
In terms of immediate steps, at a minimum, a devaluation of the Iraqi dinar (long pegged at 1,182 to the dollar) seems likely in 2021. This would relieve some pressure on the Central Bank and make the government’s expenses cheaper (since its income is in dollars), but it would also drive up inflation over time. The bigger threat is that by mid-to-late 2021, the Central Bank will no longer be able to support the government, forcing austerity through non-payment of operational expenses, including salaries.
It is clear that the government needed to adopt a policy of cutting public sector expenses while increasing its capital investment in agriculture and industry and devoting more resources to education and health. Kadhimi’s reform measures in June were too little, too late. Still, the austerity that Parliament has resisted will be inevitable if oil prices do not rise dramatically in the months to come. A key priority from an international point of view is that the IMF, as a condition for its loans, impose upon Iraq the reforms for which Allawi has been advocating and which parliament has so rejected. It does not seem likely that reform will come to Iraq by any other means.
Kirk H. Sowell is the publisher of the biweekly newsletter Inside Iraqi Politics (www.insideiraqipolitics.com). Follow him on Twitter @uticarisk.
[2] In most of these comments, Allawi gives the figures in Iraqi dinars. I have converted them to dollars. Thus, he said, for example, that the Finance Ministry had 1.3 trillion IQD when he came into office. This is slightly over $1 billion.
[3] When a family received a payment for a deceased breadwinner and receives another government benefit.
[5] Testimony by the finance minister and discussion of the budget starts at 1:38:00.
[6] In the previously cited video from Parliament on September 8, he refers to the IMF briefly around 2:25:00, then again around 2:48:00, and once more near then end of the four-hour video in response to an MP attacking the IMF option.
[7] The reading begins at 00:09:00 and the comments referred to in the text follow.
[8] Author interview conducted on October 28, 2020 via Skype.More on:
Posted in Construction, on July 5, 2020, Further cuts to MENA construction sector expected for 2020 as the region appearing to be hit with a triple whammy, per GlobalData, would sound in our opinion as a realistic assessment at this conjecture of the construction industry in the MENA.
The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) construction sector is expected to be bit by the triple whammy of lower oil production, low oil prices and contracting non-oil sectors. Leading data and analytics company GlobalData has further cut its construction output growth forecast for the region for 2020 to -2.4%, down from the previous forecast of 1.4%, in light of continued spread of COVID-19.
Yasmine Ghozzi, Economist at GlobalData, comments: “Construction activity for the remainder of 2020 is set to see poor performance. While there is usually weak construction activity in the holy month of Ramadan and during the hot summer months of June, July and August, this is usually compensated by strong performance at the beginning and end of the year. However, this will not be the case this year due to the strict lockdown policies that extended until the end of May.
“The sector is expected to face headwinds in 2021 with a slow recovery, but the pace of this will be uneven across countries in the region. Fiscal deficits and public debt levels will be substantially higher in 2021. Fiscal consolidation will hinder non-oil growth across the region, where governments still play a considerable role in spurring domestic demand.
“In addition, public investment is likely to be moderate, which will translate into fewer prospects for private sector businesses to grow – especially within sectors such as infrastructure. Expected increase in taxes, selected subsidy cuts and the introduction of several public sector service charges will influence households’ purchasing power, having a knock-on effect on future commercial investments.”
Amid the worsening situation with regards to the COVID-19 outbreak and the decline in oil prices, GlobalData has further cut its forecast for construction output growth in Saudi Arabia to -1.8% from its previous forecast of 2.9% in 2020 and expects a recovery in the sector of 3.3% in 2021. The government’s decision to host limited annual ten-day Hajj entails a possible loss of estimated revenue at more than US$10bn, adding more pressure on the Kingdom’s economy.
Ghozzi adds: “GlobalData has estimated a contraction of 2.1% in construction output growth in the UAE but expects a rebound in 2021 of 3.1%. In one of the largest global energy infrastructure transactions, Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) raised US$10bn by leasing a 49% stake in its gas pipelines for 20 years. This landmark deal is important especially during the prevailing industry downturn in order to keep profitability.
“GlobalData has also cut further the growth rates for Qatar, Kuwait and Oman in 2020 to -3.4%, -7.8% and -8.1%, respectively. Qatar’s economy this year will be affected by decline in tourist arrivals, low consumer spending and low oil prices. Nevertheless, strong fiscal stimulus and spending on infrastructure projects should provide support.
“The negative outlook for Kuwait is weighed down by lower oil prices and the prospect of a higher fiscal deficit, possibly compromising the government’s capital spending on construction and infrastructure. Business unfriendliness constitutes a barrier to reforms in the Kuwaiti economy; the extensions in tenders’ deadlines compounded by an inflexible bureaucratic procurement setup that slows decision-making will delay progress for several Kuwaiti megaprojects.”
Egypt’s construction sector is set to continue performing well despite poor performance of the non-oil sector in April. GlobalData expects construction to grow at 7.7% in 2020, slowing from 9.5% in 2019, given a short-term slow down due to the pandemic and 8.9% in 2021, and to continue maintaining a positive trend throughout the forecast period. In the Arab Maghreb, GlobalData has further cut forecasts for construction growth in Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria to -3%, -2.1%, and -2.5%, respectively, in 2020 and 0.7%, 1.2% and 1.9%, respectively, in 2021.
GlobalData has a bleak view of Iran’s construction sector throughout the forecast period. A slowdown in economic activity caused by the virus outbreak and a possible wave of further US sanctions (in the event Trump wins a second term) will continue to wreak havoc on its economy, and drastically affecting construction activities.
With, the omnipresent COVID-19 – The financial crisis of 2008 was a piece of cake as proposed by ELECTRIFYING on 9 April 2020 we are given a comparative view of the different crises that currently shake not only the world of finance but the world at large.
The world has seen difficult financial times before, like the ‘Black Tuesday’ in 1929, which we all know as the ‘Great Crash of Wall Street’. Only 13 years ago, we were able to observe another crash originating in the USA but spreading all over the world to end in a global financial crisis. Yet we see ourselves heading towards the next crisis at a frightening pace, but surely, we should be prepared and have learned our lesson from mastered crisis’.
Unfortunately, the unpleasant truth is that the world has not seen this kind of crisis before, as it is constituted genuinely different from the ones we already went through. This time the financial insecurity hasn’t been caused by banks or real estate market; it has been triggered by a global virus which led to the shutdown of economies backbone – SME businesses. The mentioned shutdown has resulted in a short-term demand and supply shock of real-economy to first affect the stock exchange due to its pro-active market responsiveness.
Further effects are the inflation of bonds and company shares as it takes some time for rating agencies screening forecasts and month-end reports until updating the credit rating of companies and governmental entities. The United Kingdom, Mexico, Brasil, Argentina, Iran, Irak and many others have already been cut.
The world has seen difficult financial times before, like the ‘Black Tuesday’ in 1929, which we all know as the ‘Great Crash of Wall Street’. Only 13 years ago, we were able to observe another crash originating in the USA but spreading all over the world to end in a global financial crisis. Yet we see ourselves heading towards the next crisis at a frightening pace, but surely, we should be prepared and have learned our lesson from mastered crisis’.
Unfortunately, the unpleasant truth is that the world has not seen this kind of crisis before, as it is constituted genuinely different from the ones we already went through. This time the financial insecurity hasn’t been caused by banks or real estate market; it has been triggered by a global virus which led to the shutdown of economies backbone – SME businesses. The mentioned shutdown has resulted in a short-term demand and supply shock of real-economy to first affect the stock exchange due to its pro-active market responsiveness.
Further effects are the inflation of bonds and company shares as it takes some time for rating agencies screening forecasts and month-end reports until updating the credit rating of companies and governmental entities. The United Kingdom, Mexico, Brasil, Argentina, Iran, Irak and many others have already been cut.
Eventually, the real estate market will as well see a correction of the booming prices due to a rising supply but limited buyers in the market, partially as an effect of travel boundaries and decreasing cash pools of investors and individuals. If there are only ten local prospective buyers compared to hundreds of international interested parties, the current peek prices will no longer be achieved.
As an upside, we don’t expect hyperinflation to kick-in caused by billions of Pounds, Dollars and Euros simultaneously flooding the markets for the sake of securing liquidity. Indeed, central banks had no other choice but to keep the printer on full throttle to steer against the sharp drop in the stock market. In contrast to an earlier crisis, globalisation and digitalisation have driven the supply of equivalent products to a majority of goods and services, e.g. Cinema vs Netflix, Restaurants vs Delivery Services, Physical Meetings vs Video Conferences. Besides, shelves in most supermarkets around the world are still filled with necessities despite numerous media promotions regarding panic buying.
As it happens, the real threat this time is the shutdown of SMEs, the resulting mass unemployment and the dropping purchasing power. Millions of people all around the world are losing their jobs, struggling to pay their rent and mortgages while facing severe existential issues. In the aftermath, tax deficiency, reduced economic growth, and ongoing down grades of institutions and countries as a whole will also impact the stock market in the long run. Hence, we expect further global economic struggles to highly depend on the realisation of global decision makers’ strategies
A lesson taught from past experience illustrates that a financial crisis always shows unexpected long-term collateral. The Imperial College of London has released a study in 2016, stating an additional 260,000 deaths linked to the financial crisis of 2007/08. This frightening result has been assigned solely to unaffordable or late cancer diagnosis/therapies of countries without universal healthcare in the OECD like the US or UK.
Within the energy sector, business is still running as usual with some effects of dropping prices due to the reduced demand. On the other hand, postponement of new installations is inevitable. Power utilities and O&M companies are classified as being essential infrastructure, which enables their staff to hit the road and keep the energy flowing. Although the restrictions and enhanced H&S measures (PPE, scheduling of lone working, unavailability and avoidance of hotels, increases of travel time, etc.) also bear additional costs to the energy sector, it has been vastly unaffected so far.
Ending this blog post with some good news, Forbes has published an astonishing figure of 72% of all energy project in 2019 were renewable, which would be an eager target for the FY2020 as well.
What direction do you see our economy heading towards?
Generations of travelers have stood before the “ksars” of Djado, wandering their crenellated walls, watchtowers, secretive passages and wells, all of them testifying to a skilled but unknown hand.
Originally posted on DESERTIFICATION: Heidelberg Earth scientists study natural climate fluctuations of the past 500,000 years – https://www.labmanager.com/news/desertification-threatens-mediterranean-forests-30224 With a view towards predicting the consequences of human-made climate change for Mediterranean ecosystems, Earth scientists from Heidelberg University have studied natural climate and vegetation fluctuations of the past 500,000 years. Their primary focus was the effects…
Originally posted on HUMAN WRONGS WATCH: Human Wrongs Watch (UN News)* — Disinformation, hate speech and deadly attacks against journalists are threatening freedom of the press worldwide, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday [2 May 2023], calling for greater solidarity with the people who bring us the news. UN Photo/Mark Garten | File photo…
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