FINANCIAL TIMES: España, una nación ambiciosa que tiene que volver a tierra
Una nación ambiciosa que tiene que volver a tierra
Publicado el 10-06-2009 , por Victor Mallet
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, el presidente del Gobierno español, ha encontrado un nuevo eslogan –menos ladrillo y más ordenadores – para describir las políticas que espera que saquen a la novena economía mundial de su peor recesión desde la muerte de Franco en 1975.
Tras 14 años de crecimiento ininterrumpido, España se enfrenta en la actualidad a un doble desafío: primero, su propia y espectacular burbuja inmobiliaria ha estallado, aumentando las filas de desempleados y dejando a la vista la excesiva dependencia de la economía del sector de la construcción; y segundo, su economía abierta se ha visto golpeada por la crisis global.
Al igual que la mayoría de sus homólogos del mundo industrializado, Zapatero optó en un principio por administrar una importante dosis de estímulos fiscales –70.000 millones de euros a distribuir entre todos los sectores, desde las obras públicas a las ayudas para la compra de vehículos– en un intento por evitar una seria depresión.En Madrid abundan las obras en carreteras que, si bien resultan molestas, crean muchos puestos de trabajo.
Mariano Rajoy, el líder de la oposición, ha descartado las medidas anti-crisis de Zapatero calificándolas de caóticas. “No existe ni orden ni coherencia”, criticó en una entrevista con Financial Times. También condenó el incremento “insostenible” de la deuda nacional de España y exigió un periodo de austeridad.
Pedro Solbes, el cansado ministro de Economía y defensor de la ortodoxia en los presupuestos, intentó en vano frenar el gasto del Ejecutivo y fue finalmente excluido del gabinete en abril. Miguel Angel Fernández Ordóñez, el gobernador del Banco de España, también fue objeto de las críticas de los ministros por expresar su preocupación sobre el gasto público, el sistema de pensiones y el rígido mercado laboral.
Pero tanto Elena Salgado, la sucesora de Solbes, como el propio Zapatero han reconocido que España dispone en la actualidad de poco margen de maniobra y tiene que seleccionar bien los gastos.El país perdió su ráting triple A de Standard & Poor's en enero, y sufre uno de los giros presupuestarios más extremos de Europa, pasando de un superávit del 2,2% del producto interior bruto en 2007 a un déficit el próximo año que se estima en el 10% de PIB.
La nueva estrategia del gobierno –aparte de menos viviendas y más ordenadores, Zapatero también quiere menos petróleo y más energías renovables – se basa en la fortaleza de España en tecnologías de energía solar y eólica, y supone el reconocimiento oficial tardío de que el viejo modelo de crecimiento basado en la construcción está agotado.
“Cambiar el modelo energético mundial es el reto más significativo que afronta la humanidad en esta generación, no sólo por su impacto sobre el cambio climático sino también por sus efectos sobre el modelo económico”, declaró Zapatero en una reciente entrevista con Financial Times y otra prensa económica.
Tanto los inversores españoles como los extranjeros coinciden en que el Gobierno no puede rociar indefinidamente la economía con dinero prestado, y señalan que ha llegado la hora de que España cambie de estrategia, ahora que se ha puesto a la altura de la mayoría de sus vecinos europeos.
“El modelo de crecimiento que hemos tenido durante los últimos quince años se ha agotado. Nuestro crecimiento se basaba en industrias como el sector servicios, con poco valor añadido y una escasa necesidad de formación”, explica Pedro de Esteban, director gerente para Europa de Carlyle, el grupo de capital riesgo. Las cifras ponen de manifiesto lo que pasa cuando un modelo como ése deja de funcionar.
El desempleo en España alcanza ya los 4 millones, más del 17% de la población activa, un dato muy superior al del resto de la Unión Europea. El paro ha afectado sobre todo a los inmigrantes que llegaron al país en los últimos años y encontraron un empleo en los sectores de la construcción y del turismo.
Todo apunta a que el PIB experimente una caída del 4% durante este año, previsiones en cualquier caso mejores que las de la demanda interna, seriamente afectada por la drástica caída de las importaciones.Los economistas opinan que la recesión del país se prolongará más que en el resto de Europa y podría llegar hasta finales de 2010.
La actual situación supone un duro golpe a la confianza española en la escena internacional. Durante años, el rápido crecimiento del país llegó a convertirse en una forma de publicitar los beneficios de pertenecer a la UE. España crecía a un ritmo superior que sus países vecinos.
Charles Powell, del Real Instituto Elcano, asegura que, a partir de 2013, y después de haber sido durante mucho tiempo receptora neta de fondos de la UE, España podría terminar siendo un contribuyente neto.
Todo parece indicar que la economía de España no crecerá a un ritmo tan rápido como en años anteriores, pero, en opinión del presidente Zapatero, el país cuenta con ventajas que podrían ayudar al país a salir reforzado de la crisis.
Entre éstas se encuentra un sistema bancario relativamente sólido, poco afectado por los activos tóxicos de EEUU, que sin embargo se ha visto abrumado por la severidad de la crisis inmobiliaria, que ha obligado al Banco de España a intervenir en Caja Castilla La Mancha. El país también presume de contar con empresas punteras en energías alternativas y en sectores como las infraestructuras, el turismo, la moda y la electrónica de defensa.
A pesar de las importantes divisiones políticas entre la derecha y la izquierda, existe un amplio consenso entre los líderes empresariales, que creen que las actuales ventajas económicas dejarán de tener sentido a largo plazo si no se introducen reformas estructurales en la economía.
El mercado laboral español, rápido en la creación de empleo en épocas de crecimiento y en su destrucción en momentos como éste debido al alto índice de contratos temporales, es uno de los principales objetivos de las reformas, aunque las fuerzas sociales no se ponen de acuerdo sobre la mejor solución. También despierta polémica el grado de autonomía de las 17 comunidades.
Las regiones más ricas se quejan de los subsidios que reciben las más desfavorecidas. Por otra parte, el sistema judicial no está adaptado a una economía moderna. El nivel de escuelas y universidades es deficiente en comparación con otros países industrializados. El sector privado no invierte lo suficiente en I+D. “No creo que estemos peor que otros países y pienso que podemos recuperarnos en poco tiempo.
Sin embargo, a medio plazo, sí soy más pesimista sobre nuestras perspectivas, a menos que se establezca un diálogo sobre las reformas necesarias para hacer frente a los problemas estructurales que tenemos”, explica de Esteban.
Dada la actual situación del sector inmobiliario, es lógico que Zapatero deje de ver crecimiento en el ladrillo y apueste por la asignación de ordenadores a los alumnos. La cuestión es si las escuelas y el mercado laboral mejorarán lo suficiente para que los estudiantes puedan sacar partido de los ordenadores y consolidar la prosperidad que tanto trabajo le ha costado conseguir a España.
The Financial Times Limited 2009. All Rights Reserved
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High-flier must come down to earth
By Victor Mallet
Published: June 9 2009 15:22 Last updated: June 9 2009 15:22
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Spain’s Socialist prime minister, has found a new slogan – menos ladrillo y más ordenadores (“less bricks and mortar, more computers”) – to describe the policies he hopes will pull the world’s ninth largest economy out of its deepest recession since the death of the dictator Franco in 1975.
After 14 years of uninterrupted growth, Spain now faces a daunting double challenge: first, its own spectacular domestic housing bubble has collapsed, swelling the ranks of the unemployed and exposing the economy’s excessive dependence on homebuilding; and second, its open economy has been hit by the global crisis.
Like most of his fellow presidents and prime ministers in the industrialised world, Mr Zapatero initially administered a heavy dose of fiscal stimulus – €70bn ($97bn) to be spent on everything from public works to subsidies for car-buyers – in an attempt to stave off a full-blown depression.
Central Madrid, where previously unemployed workers are moving a statue of Christopher Columbus from one side of the Plaza de Colón to the other, is scarred with disruptive but job-rich road works.
Mariano Rajoy, leader of the conservative opposition Popular party, has dismissed Mr Zapatero’s anti-crisis measures as chaotic. “There’s no order or coherence,” he said in an FT interview. He also condemned the “untenable” rise of Spain’s national debt and called for a period of austerity.
Pedro Solbes, the weary finance minister and voice of budgetary orthodoxy, sought in vain to curb government spending and was finally pushed out of the cabinet in April. Miguel Angel Fernández Ordóñez, central bank governor, also came under fire from ministers for expressing concerns about public spending, the pension system and the inflexible labour market.
But both Elena Salgado, Mr Solbes’s successor, and Mr Zapatero himself have acknowledged that Spain now has limited room for manoeuvre and must be selective about spending.
The country lost its triple A credit rating from Standard & Poor’s in January, and is now suffering one of the most extreme budgetary turnrounds in Europe, moving from a surplus of 2.2 per cent of gross domestic product in 2007 to a projected deficit next year of nearly 10 per cent of GDP.
The government’s new strategy – as well as fewer houses and more computers, Mr Zapatero wants “less oil and more renewable energy” – plays to Spain’s strengths in wind and solar power technology and is a belated official recognition that the old, labour-intensive growth model based on the construction industry has run its course.
“To change the world’s energy model is the most significant challenge facing humanity in this generation, not only for the impact on climate change but also for its effects on the economic model,” Mr Zapatero said in a recent interview with the FT and other business newspapers.
Spanish and foreign investors agree that the government cannot spray the economy with borrowed money indefinitely and say the time has come for Spain to change its approach now that it has caught up with most of its European neighbours.
“The growth model that we have had for the past 15 years is exhausted,” says Pedro de Esteban, a managing director for Europe of the Carlyle private equity group. “Our growth has been on the back of industries requiring low qualifications, including service industries with low value-added and little need for training.”
The numbers tell the story of what happens when such a model stops working. Spanish unemployment has soared to more than 4m – more than 17 per cent of the workforce and far higher than in the rest of the European Union – and has particularly affected the immigrants who flooded in in recent years to work on farms, building sites and in tourist hotels.
Gross domestic product is expected to fall by nearly 4 per cent this year. Even this grim forecast is better than the likely performance of domestic demand by a couple of percentage points because imports have fallen much faster than exports.
Economists say Spain’s recession will be exceptionally long and could last until the end of 2010.
All this has been a blow to Spanish self-confidence in the international arena. For years, rapid growth made it an advertisement for the benefits of EU membership.
It was successfully catching up – “converging” in EU parlance – by growing faster than its neighbours.
Charles Powell of the Elcano Royal Institute, a think-tank, says that from 2013 Spain may even become a net contributor of funds to the EU after years of being a “poor” country on the receiving end of financial aid. “It is the paradoxical dilemma facing a country that has finally caught up,” he says.
Spain’s developed economy may not be able to grow as fast as it did when it was still developing but, as Mr Zapatero’s new slogan implies, it does have advantages that could help the country emerge stronger from the crisis.
They include a relatively strong banking system hardly touched by US toxic assets, albeit one weighed down by the severity of a housing downturn that has already driven Caja Castilla La Mancha, a small savings bank, into the arms of the Bank of Spain.
The country also boasts successful companies in alternative energy and sectors from infrastructure and tourism to fashion and defence electronics.
It is still marked by deep political divisions between left and right, but there is a broad consensus, and almost universal agreement among business leaders, that none of the current economic advantages will amount to much in the long term without fundamental structural reforms to the economy.
The Spanish labour market – quick to create jobs in the good times and to destroy them in the bad because of the gulf between temporary workers and protected permanent employees – is a prime target for reform, although opinions differ on the best solution.
Equally controversial is the degree of autonomy enjoyed by the 17 regions.
The richer regions complain about excessive subsidies for the poorer ones and central Spain worries about Basque, Catalan and Galician nationalism on the periphery.
The justice system is painfully slow and ill suited to a modern economy.
Schools and universities are generally poor compared with those of other industrialised nations, and there is a shortage of private sector research and development.
“I don’t think we’re worse off than other countries and I’m not as pessimistic as some in terms of our ability to recover in the short term,” says Mr de Esteban of Carlyle in Barcelona.
“However, I am pessimistic about Spain in the medium term, unless there is serious discussion and deep reform to deal with the structural problems we have.”
With the housing market crushed by the crisis, Mr Zapatero will certainly see less new construction with bricks and mortar, and his government plans to start putting computers in the hands of all Spanish students.
The question is whether schools and jobs will improve enough for the students to use the computers profitably and entrench Spain’s hard-won prosperity.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Language policy: Linguistic diversity may be too much of a good thing
By Victor Mallet
Published: June 9 2009 15:22 Last updated: June 9 2009 15:22
Foreign holidaymakers in the Spanish Pyrenean ski resorts of the Val d’Aran have been known to scratch their heads over one of the area’s trilingual tourist pamphlets.
The second and third languages, as soon becomes clear from the text and the flags alongside, are Catalan and Spanish, but what on earth is the first? The answer is Aranese, a form of Occitan or Gascon, spoken by about 5,000 people.
Minority languages, fostered by regional and local governments, have undergone a revival in Spain since the end of the Franco dictatorship in the 1970s.
The generalissimo enforced control from the centre. Languages such as Catalan and Basque were banned from public use, and citizens were obliged to give their children Spanish names. The commonly used word for Spanish – castellano or Castilian – reveals the roots of the language in central Spain.
Linguistic revival in Catalonia, Valencia, the Balearic islands, the Basque country and Galicia has gone hand-in-hand with the steady increase in regional autonomy since a democratic constitution was introduced in 1978. Catalan and Basque nationalists in particular regard their languages – along with their political autonomy and specific legal systems – as essential to their sense of nationhood.
Salvador Giner, chairman of the Institut d’Estudis Catalans, the regional academy, points proudly to a Castilian-speaking workman who responds to him in broken Catalan in the 17th century baroque palace in Barcelona that houses the institute.
“We melt immediately any time a foreign academic speaks a few words in Catalan,” says Mr Giner, recalling the “40 years of cultural genocide” against Catalan under Franco.
Catalan nationalists are lucky their language is already spoken by most Catalans and, like Galician, is easily mastered by any speaker of a romance language such as Spanish, French, Italian or Portuguese.
Not so with Basque, which is spoken by only a minority of Basques, is of unknown origin, has a fiendishly complex grammar, and has no connection with romance tongues other than borrowings from them for modern words.
In central Spain and among Castilian-speakers, however, there are signs of irritation at the increasingly nationalistic language policies of some regions, as well as a belief that investors will be deterred by the fracturing of the Spanish state into linguistically distinct enclaves.
On the other hand, a sense of hostility to Spanish hegemony in Catalonia or the Basque country is often accompanied by a more international outlook and an eagerness to learn English or French.
The two most contentious areas are education – some residents of Catalonia and the Basque country want their children taught in Spanish – and public services such as hospitals, where local language tests can discriminate against doctors who do not speak the local language even if all their patients understand Spanish.
“In the Basque country, to get a job as a doctor, knowing Basque counts for 17 points. To know English, French or German is five points, but to know castellano is zero points,” laments Mariano Rajoy, leader of the opposition Popular party.
The PP, which can trace its origins back to Francoism even if it would rather not, is the natural home of centrists and Spanish nationalists, and has been bolstered by two regional elections in March. It won outright in Galicia and joined its Socialist rivals to oust the moderate Basque nationalists in the Basque country.
Mr Rajoy has to tread cautiously in order not to alienate the regional parties that he might need to support a future government, but favours choice in schools – with the aim of bilingualism – and an end to language discrimination in public recruitment.
Nationalists, especially in Catalonia – where the local language is vibrant and widely spoken – say that if there are any language problems, they lie with monolingual Spaniards.
“The linguistic reality of Catalonia is that all the people who want can speak castellano. There’s no conflict,” says Antoni Castells, the urbane and multilingual Catalan finance minister.
“Our aim is to make a bilingual society. There’s no Catalan who doesn’t speak Castilian, but on the other hand you can find people that speak only Castilian.”
These debates will continue across Spain, and doubtless in many languages, although the power of politicians to control the way languages develop is always dubious.
In the Basque country, Euskaltzaindia, the language academy in Bilbao, has spent decades trying to create a standard from the spoken dialects and has inevitably been accused of creating an “artificial” language, albeit one understood by up to 1m people and spoken daily by perhaps a quarter of those.
Now young Basques, according to Andrés Urrutia, who heads the academy, have started to speak an informal mixture of euskera (Basque) and español (Spanish) known as euskañol, which he says would disturb him if they started to write it as well.
So is the decline of the local language inevitable? “It is gaining people who speak it more often,” says Prof Urrutia.
“I think what is inevitable is that we can’t be monolingual.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
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