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INSIDECOSTARICA.COM
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CENTRAL AMERICA
NEWS BRIEFS
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Monday 03
January 2011 |
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El
Salvador
Optimistic
over
Economic
Recovery
in 2011
San
Salvador
- The
Government
of El
Salvador
is
confident
that the
country's
production
engine
will
start
moving
up in
2011
after
the
national
economy
crossed
from
zero to
positive
signs in
2010.
Official
reports
indicate
that
this
nation
was one
of the
most
affected
in the
continent
by the
2008
crisis
in the
USA, its
main
source
of trade
and
remittances.
The
impact
was so
severe
that the
Gross
Domestic
Product
(GDP)
fell to
minus
3.3
percent
in 2009,
a hole
from
where
the
nation
started
to get
out in
2010,
with a
growth
close to
one
percent.
Leaders
of the
Farabundo
Marti
National
Liberation
Front (FMLN),
now in
power,
blame
the
harsh
crisis
on the
failure
of the
neoliberal
policies
previous
administrations
pursued.
President
Mauricio
Funes
hopes
that the
economy
will
recover
in 2011
with a
2.5
percent
growth
particularly
helped
by State
investments
in
production
and
infrastructure.
Funes
said
that the
government
will
spend
over 1.2
billion
dollars,
with
which he
hopes to
encourage,
too, the
private
sector.
It is a
golden
opportunity
to
provide
families
in El
Salvador
with
work,
service,
employment
and
income,
Funes
said in
one of
his
recent
speeches.
The plan
could
shore up
the
construction
industry
that
generates
many
jobs. It
has been
three
years in
a row in
recession
with
negative
numbers.
Government's
social
programs
are also
aimed at
helping
medium,
small
and
micro
enterprises
to
foster
business
and thus
create
jobs.
More
than six
thousand
of these
entrepreneurs
make
uniforms,
shoes
and
school
supplies
for the
Ministry
of
Education
that
distributes
them,
free of
charge
since
last
year, to
more
than 1.3
million
students.
The
government
estimates
that
comprehensive
health
reform,
underway
since
last
year for
universal
health
care to
previously
excluded
sectors,
can
generate
about
14,000
jobs.
In
addition,
there'll
be
investment
in
infrastructure,
productive
partnerships
with
private
capital,
increased
wages
and
pensions
to the
public
sector
that
besides
improving
the
living
conditions
of
public
employees,
they
will
increase
domestic
consumption.
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