Eduardo González
The attraction of international investments to Spain is the main objective of the intense working day that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, will hold tomorrow on the occasion of his participation in the Davos Forum in 2023, which will bring together more than fifty heads of State and Government and will inevitably be marked by the consequences of the war in Ukraine.
The Swiss town of Davos, the highest city in Europe (1,560 meters), will host from today until January 20 the 53 World Economic Forum, organized by the WEF (World Economic Forum). Under the theme Cooperation in a Fragmented World, this year’s edition (the first in three years without health restrictions) will bring together more than 2,700 people, including heads of state and government, business CEOs, civil society leaders and global media. The meeting will focus on five topical issues: the energy and food crises, the problems of inflation, low growth and rising debt, the challenges facing industry, social vulnerabilities and major geopolitical risks.
Among the political leaders in attendance were German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, South African President Cyril M. Ramaphosa, President of South Africa, President of the Swiss Confederation, President of the Swiss Confederation and President of the Swiss Confederation. Ramaphosa; the President of Switzerland, Alain Berset; the Prime Minister of Belgium, Alexander De Croo; the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro; the Head of Government of Morocco, Aziz Akhannouch; the President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos; and the President of Poland, Andrzej Duda. The United States will be represented, among others, by the Presidential Climate Envoy, John F. Kerry, and China will be represented by the Vice Premier, Liu He.
Also attending will be the president of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde; the secretary general of the UN, Antonio Guterres; the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Kristalina Georgieva; the director general of the World Trade Organization, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala; the secretary general of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg; the director general of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus; and the executive director of the International Energy Agency, Fatih Birol, among other leaders of multilateral organizations.
The Spanish delegation, headed by Pedro Sánchez, will also include the First Vice-President of the Government and Minister of Economic Affairs, Nadia Calviño; the Third Vice-President and Minister for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, Teresa Ribera, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, in addition to representatives of some of the country’s main companies.
Pedro Sánchez’s agenda
According to Moncloa sources, Pedro Sánchez’s activity will be focused, above all, on contacts with the business and financial world and less on political meetings. In this regard, the Government considers that the head of the Executive already maintains an intense political activity in other international forums and that Davos is, above all, an excellent opportunity to strengthen relations with large companies in order to attract investments to Spain.
With this starting point, all the activity of the President of the Government will take place tomorrow, Tuesday, which will begin with the so-called Country Strategic Dialogue, closed-door meetings with between six and eight senior business executives (especially from the financial and energy sectors), before whom Sánchez will present the Spanish economic situation and Spain’s views on the major global challenges. After this meeting, the head of the Executive will hold an informal courtesy meeting with the leaders of Spanish companies present in Davos, such as Telefónica, Santander, BBVA, Ferrovial, Repsol, Cepsa, Naturgy and Gamesa.
At around four o’clock in the afternoon, Pedro Sánchez will address the Davos plenary for half an hour, together with the president of the Forum, Børge Brende. In his speech, the Prime Minister will explain his vision on national and international issues, the situation of the Spanish economy and investment opportunities in Spain. The aforementioned Moncloa sources did not advance any further details, but they did indicate that, in general terms, Sánchez’s speech will be in line with the one he gave last Thursday in Madrid during the closing ceremony of the XIII Edition of the international financial forum Spain Investors Day, which brought together major international investors and in which he spoke about the “extraordinary strengths” of the Spanish economy in the face of the uncertainty generated by the war in Ukraine.
On the other hand, Pedro Sánchez will meet tomorrow with executives of large multinational companies in the industrial and financial fields, such as the chemical company Dow Chemical Company (USA), the French multinational industrial gases company Air Liquide, ArcelorMittal (the world’s largest steel company), the American microchip company Qualcomm, the Chinese energy multinational Envision and the Danish business conglomerate Maersk.
He will also meet with important investment funds, such as Larry Fink’s BlackRock (the world’s largest) and the sovereign wealth fund Mubadala of the United Arab Emirates, and will meet with the recently appointed president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Ilan Goldfajn, and with the leaders of Oxfam International, at the request of the NGO itself. The day will conclude with a gala dinner offered (behind closed doors) by the host and founder of the Forum, the Swiss Klaus Schwab, which will be attended by heads of state and government, international organizations, members of the Board of Trustees, CEOs of companies and strategic partners. In addition, Pedro Sánchez will give interviews to the television networks CNBC and CNN.
