WILLEMSTAD — To realize an economic growth again Curaçao must economize, reform and become cheaper, director of contractors’ association AAV Mike Willem wrote in a press report. Willem wrote it’s said that ‘in the past 20 years Curaçao registered an economic growth of only 1 percent per year and a relatively high unemployment of around 10 percent’.

He quoted the IMF-report from 2011, which stated that ‘in addition to immediate economies in the order of 2 to 3 percent of the GNP, structural reforms are necessary to make Curaçao ‘competitive’ again and structurally boost export and investments’. According to Willem, Curaçao is too expensive now and therefore not competitive. A growth can be realized again by making the ‘product Curaçao’ cheaper. “This will lead to a higher living standard through a general increase of the actual incomes, creating more demand for goods and services and the production of such on a large scale, a higher realization percentage and more confidence from companies and consumers leading to more investments. More income, demand and investments will yield more tax revenues. The latter will improve the government’s position to maintain a proper level of service. This will also lead to an improvement of the balance of payments.”

More expensive

Willem: “The current plans are not the reforms that we need. These plans only make the product Curaçao more expensive.” He referred to the current AOV-plan, the plans on the medical insurance and the new compulsory pension scheme with its premium increases. “It is self-evident that this will drive us in the opposite direction and have negative effects on the GNP, the national finances, the employment, the spending power and demand, on the balance of payments, et cetera. In any case this will be disastrous for the building sector that already experienced a negative growth for three years. It will only reduce the survival probabilities of the companies during these difficult times and lead to loss of jobs. The AAV therefore hopes the correct structural reforms will be introduced.”