The Diplomat
The Exporters and Investors Club yesterday defended the need for structural reforms to facilitate an increase in the number of exporting companies in Spain, as currently only 59,000 companies export regularly and of these only 25,000 sell more than 50,000 euros a year abroad.
The president of the Exporters and Investors Club, Antonio Bonet, said in a statement that although the foreign trade data published on Thursday continue to show the dynamism of the foreign sector, a stable regulatory environment and economic policies that facilitate international competitiveness are needed.
“It is essential that structural reforms are undertaken to simplify bureaucracy and the regulatory environment, to facilitate the growth of SMEs, and that the education system trains our young people in the competencies and skills that companies need”, stressed Bonet, who highlighted the importance that the foreign sector can have in boosting the recovery of the Spanish economy.
In this respect, he warned that the creation of new taxes affecting different sectors such as energy and banking “means increasing uncertainty and discouraging business investment at a time when what the country needs is precisely the opposite; in other words, to increase business investment in order to gain efficiency and competitiveness”.
According to data published on Thursday by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism, the trade deficit reached 31,963.2 million euros in the first half of the year, which is almost six times the 5,397.3 million euros of the same period last year.
This result is the result of strong imports, which grew by 40.7% in the period and reached a record high of 222,882 million euros, while exports rose by 24.8% to 190,919 million euros, also a record high for the period. The coverage rate (ratio between exports and imports) stood at 85.7%.
Behind this sharp rise in the trade deficit is also the increase in the energy deficit to 25,894 million euros, while the non-energy deficit showed a balance of 6,069.4 million euros.
For the Exporters’ Club, although foreign trade indicators show “dynamism” in the export sector, with an increase of 6.6% in volume, this “is not enough to compensate for the growing trade deficit”.
“Despite the fact that the international context is very adverse, as in the previous crisis, we believe that the Spanish foreign sector can act as an engine for economic recovery,” insisted Bonet.
