Bérenger Statements That Don't Survive A Fact-Check

1. I'm the real father of the economic miracle (2019). Something Ramgoolam acknowledged in parliament a few weeks ago. The problem with this statement is that Bérenger was Finance Minister for only nine months as from June 1982 and alliance partners spent a lot of their time fighting each other which left very little time to hatch such a miracle. Plus Bérenger returned as FM between 2000 and 2003 during which time he presented not one but three budgets. We know what one of his colleagues had to say about the economy back then. And that there are problems with this notion of economic miracle.

2. Mauritius is the best managed country in the world (2003). That's what Bérenger repeated several times when he was PM. You need to wonder which yardsticks he was using to arrive at such a conclusion. 

Subron Statements That Don't Survive A Fact-Check

1. We have reached the end of a cycle so we need a new constitution (2023 onwards). Bérenger and Ramgoolam have reached an advanced age and are way past the date they should have retired from active politics. Ramgoolam hasn't been looking healthy for quite some time – and he's been an unmitigated disaster as PM when he was – while Bérenger is seeing at least one ghost in Parliament. Subron is now a pensioner. Our constitution has not aged one bit though. It's still a national treasure that will serve us well for the next 100,000 years albeit with a few overdue additions. Subron seems to be confusing the cycles that a typical human goes through with our awesome constitution that was built to last many centuries. It's like the Hindu numerals, they have not gone out of fashion for the past 2,000 years. I don't know of anybody who wants their smartphone to run on Roman numerals.

2. Our FPTP system doesn't allow any new party to emerge (At least since 2010). 

What Did Trees in Beau-Vallon and Our Savings Culture Have in Common?

Another bleak reality is the decline in national savings rate. It has fallen from an average of 26 percent of GDP in the period 1996-2000 to 24.6 percent in the period 2001-2005. CSO is forecasting a very low savings rate of 19.5 percent for 2005. Here again, we must be utterly concerned. 

Rama Sithanen, 2005

... il a fait beaucoup de tort à la culture d'épargne des Mauriciens en enlevant les exemptions fiscales sur les prêts immobiliers ainsi que les études supérieures de leurs enfants, 

tout en taxant les intérêts bancaires.

Dan Bundhoo, 2014

Simple. They had gone through plenty but survived. There's a word for this and it is resilience. Granted it's a term that has been abused in Mauritius over the past decade. But it's easy to show what it really means. As RAFAL wrote about the resilience of trees recently I will focus on our savings culture. 

Why You Forgot 2018 is The Year of The 'Second Economic Miracle'

... je pense que vers 2008 nous pouvons réaliser un taux de croissance de 7/8%.

Rama Sithanen, 2005

54. In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting. 

Pope Francis, Apostolic Exhortation 2013 

No Miracle in Sight

Half of the fourth year of the Lepep government is almost gone and still no trace of the exceptional economic performance SAJ had promised for 2018. Only growth rates of less than 4% so far and the next two years are not likely to be any different. These are the lowest in decades. 

Why Implementing Lalit's Advice Makes A Lot of Sense

You know, the one that recommends bizin plant manze lor later tablisman. This is good advice any which way you look at it. Let's start with a historical perspective. As Chart 1 shows you don't need to be the best thing since sliced bread to understand that the sugar industry has been in an irreversible sunset phase for a long time. It accounted for close to a quarter of GDP forty years ago. Now at less than 1% it's about twenty-five times smaller. That too despite the silly policy of 'competitive depreciation' aka politik rupi mari feb. We can even calculate the approximate time it will hit the zero mark. That should definitely inform our national strategic decisions. Keeping a corpse on costly artificial respiration many years after the soul has departed ain't exactly a smart decision especially when at the same time you cut the oxygen supply of incubators. We can keep a 100 hectares as a souvenir. At most.

Why Our Youth Don't Have A Skills Mismatch

Simply because technology has flattened every single learning curve. So anybody who has recently graduated should be able to help push Mauritius forward provided a reasonable number of opportunities are available. This will happen only if certain conditions are met. Like energy prices -- a major building block of GDP -- shouldn't stay disconnected from their world prices. Something which unfortunately happened for way too long.

We want our youth to transform the skills they've acquired -- and will keep on acquiring -- into meaningful outcomes fast because otherwise they will lose confidence in themselves and their gifts will go to waste. And then it will be everybody's loss. This will also depend on the quality of policy-making at Government House. The latter just like the private sector -- large and small -- must make good bets. Because that's the way they will create wealth or value. Which is about getting out more than what is put in. For example the CEB can float a bond, invest into a power project and then make a reasonable profit. Or sell clean electricity at competitive prices which will help Mauritius Inc. make one. The Passport Office can get us our travel documents fast making us save time which is another name for money. Similarly private sector companies can create value by moving upmarket or into new industries which are compatible with the standards of living that Mauritians reasonably aspire to. Not with those of the cheapest foreign worker available.

The other side of the coin is that Government and private sector companies routinely destroy value. And they do that -- to be sure there are fans of Marx too in there --  in many ways. We've seen how the STC can mysteriously lose billions and then lose a couple of billions more. Bosses of private companies may also put the enjoyment of super cars before the survival of their firm. Or allow themselves to be infected with hubris and start believing that this time it's different and that crises like those that happened in South East Asia in 1997 and elsewhere can never happen in Mauritius. Because we're the land of the lazy Dodo. Of course.

The Fallacy of the Triple External Shocks Argument

In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry, it’s the exact opposite.

Paul Dirac

Because most stars are so far away, their light has yet to reach Earth.

Edgar Allan Poe solving Olber’s Paradox in a poem

I don’t know about you but me, I have had an overdose of the so-called Triple External Shocks argument brought forward and used ad nauseam by Rama Sithanen for many months now to paint a very dark picture of our economy. The main problem with this argument is that it stands on shaky grounds at best. Let me tell you why.

1st shock: Price of sugar to fall by 5% this year and up to 36% within a few years
We knew that this was coming for a long time so that there is no element of surprise or shock here. We have been growing sugar for 300 years now and it’s been the commodity that has financed the development of other pillars of our economy – under that famous protocol – which incidentally have now dwarfed the sugar sector itself. Paradoxically, Le Grand Argentier has perhaps failed to realise that by recently announcing that the seafood hub would double in size in a few years’ time it will be yet another sector to dwarf King Sugar.
The share of sugar in the economy will inexorably keep on shrinking from its current 5%. This looks like a textbook example of the Product Life Cycle at work – you can only produce something for a given amount of time before you are outgunned by entrants with a lower cost structure than yours. Yes, the economics of the cane industry looks better than that of the sugar industry but we need to look even beyond. And this year’s price cut of 5% shouldn’t have taken so much of our Finance Minister’s saliva. The €URO has also been surging ahead this year, hasn’t it? Naturally, we should see it to it that we are treated fairly by the European Union.