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Thomas Bach focused on how peace is the essence of the Olympics but also how fragile it is in a speech yesterday at the opening of the final International Olympic Committee session he will preside over after 12 years in power.The seven candidates vying to succeed the 71-year-old German as IOC president were in the audience gathered in a marquee as the rain poured at Olympia, the birthplace of the Olympics.Bach’s successor will be elected tomorrow but he will remain till June to ensure a smooth handover, something not accorded to him when he replaced Jacques Rogge in 2013.“The Olympic Games and the values they represent have endured for millennia,” said Bach.“And yet, the course of human history reminds us of their fragility.”Bach himself has had a turbulent ride including a Russian doping scandal at the 2014 Sochi Winter Games, Russia’s invasions of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 and the Covid pandemic.The latter forced the postponement of the 2020 Tokyo Summer Games to 2021 and affected the 2022 Beijing Winter Games.Bach, speaking at a ceremony which mixed speeches by Greek dignitaries and entertainment including a rousing rendition of “Zorba The Greek”, said the rain was a good omen.He said the heavy rain at the Paris 2024 Games opening ceremony was followed by a successful fortnight of competition.“Nothing can go wrong,” he said drily, referring to the Session.Bach’s more serious message was about the original Olympic Truce (the ekecheiria), how warring nations laid down arms for just over two weeks and how the concept was revived by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, seen as the creator of the modern Games.“Then as now, the idea of promoting peace through sport was in stark contrast to the prevailing Zeitgeist,” said Bach.“When we see today how Coubertin went against all the divisive and bellicose trends of his time, we can only admire even more his courage and audacity.”Bach, who won fencing team gold in the 1976 Montreal Games, had to balance the strong emotions aroused over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine when it came to Russian participation in Paris last year.Ultimately some were permitted to – if they met certain conditions – but only as neutral athletes.“The athletes even came together before the opening of the Olympic Games to make a moving call for peace,” he said.“This call for peace included athletes whose countries are presently divided by war and conflict.“The athletes showed us how our world would be, if we all were to live in this Olympic spirit of peaceful co-existence.”

Banks in Qatar exhibit sufficient profitability and robust capital strength, with both Tier 1 and capital adequacy ratio (CAR) surpassing the mandated regulatory thresholds, a report by EY has shown.Domestic funding avenues are predicted to adequately finance credit expansion in Qatar this year with the completion of major infrastructure projects and increased liquefied natural gas (LNG) production, ‘EY GCC Banking Sector Outlook 2024 report’ said.“The expansion of gas production in Qatar will underpin the resilience of local banks this year,” it said.According to the report, GCC banks will continue to benefit from strong capital levels, supporting their overall performance in 2025. Credit growth in most GCC countries is broadly based on a strong project pipeline, with aggregate contract awards driven by infrastructure development, especially in Saudi Arabia and the UAE.The positive trajectory is expected to continue in the near future. This outlook is supported by rising lending volumes, increased fee income, stable margins and effective cost management. As the cost of lending turns more favorable, GCC countries might expand their investments globally.EY MENA Financial Services leader Mayur Pau noted, “As we go into the first quarter of 2025, the GCC banking industry should remain strong due to considerable capital cushions, healthy asset quality indicators and adequate profitability. Furthermore, resilient economies, the region’s economic diversification efforts and enabling policies will support higher consumption and investment, further boosting the sector’s performance.“The upcoming financial year looks to be a transformative period, with advancements in technology, shifts in consumer behavior and regulatory changes shaping the future of banking.”Non-oil growth remains a bright spot: GDP growth in the GCC is projected at 3.5% in 2025. Interest rate cuts, together with further investment and structural reform initiatives, will mean non-oil growth of over 3.4% in the region’s two largest economies – Saudi Arabia and the UAE.As per the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the current account surplus is expected to be 8.2% of the GDP in 2025. On the fiscal front, a surplus of 3.9% of the GDP is forecast for 2025.Global oil demand is forecasted to increase by 1.6mn bpd to 104.5mn bpd in 2025, reflecting the end of the post-Covid-19 pandemic release of pent-up demand, challenging global economic conditions and clean energy technology deployment.Non-OPEC+ producers are likely to account for the bulk of the increase if OPEC+ voluntary cuts remain in place. High oil prices – with the average for 2024 estimated at $81 per barrel – and favorable economic growth have supported the GCC banks’ healthy finances.GDP growth in the GCC is forecast to rebound to 3.5% in 2024, up from 1.4%, as oil production gradually increases, providing a boost to the region's economies, EY said.Hydrocarbon growth is likely to be 3.3%, while non-hydrocarbon sectors are forecast to grow at 3.4%, supported by strong domestic investment momentum.GCC banks have shown sustained growth in credit facilities during 2024, supported by economic transformation plans, robust project pipeline, healthy demand and resilient economic conditions. The banks are well-capitalised with strong asset quality indicator and are likely to uphold this strong performance trajectory throughout 2025.“To fortify their profitability and improve cost optimisation in the current landscape, GCC banks should consider how to best to navigate a new normal that not only addresses regulatory fragmentation and national interests, but fully harnesses the power of technology and its multiple scopes such as digitisation, generative AI (GenAI), open banking and APIs, and the digital currency revolution – all while committing to a sustainable future. This will ensure they remain competitive and agile to better counteract the pressure of contracting margins,” Pau said.Ends

The University of Doha for Science and Technology (UDST) hosted an insightful keynote session addressing the evolving landscape of language education and the growing impact of artificial intelligence. The session, attended by faculty and students, explored the transition from a digital divide to one increasingly shaped by AI advancements.President of UDST Dr Salem Al-Naemi said: “At UDST, we recognise the transformative power of artificial intelligence in education and the necessity of preparing our students and faculty for the opportunities and challenges it brings.”Dr Mohammad Etedali, senior lecturer at LUT/LAB University in Finland, discussed the rapid technological shifts that have redefined education, particularly in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. He emphasised how the pandemic accelerated the adoption of digital solutions, much like AI is now shaping new paradigms in teaching and learning.The session sparked meaningful discussions on the opportunities and challenges AI presents, highlighting UDST’s commitment to equipping students and educators with the knowledge and skills needed to thrive in an AI-driven world.

Germany has just announced another “Zeitenwende”: a turning point when long-held beliefs are abandoned in favour of new, more promising strategies. That term was what German Chancellor Olaf Scholz used to describe the situation on February 27, 2022, days after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, when he promised to mobilise resources to support the Ukrainians and the democratic values for which they were fighting. Yet as important as this announcement was, it was not accompanied by a reset of Germany’s fiscal regime and monetarist orthodoxy.Hampered by the “debt brake,” a rule restricting annual borrowing to 0.35% of GDP that was added to Germany’s constitution only in 2009, the country was stumbling along. It prided itself for fiscal prudence as Ukraine was battered, as its own infrastructure crumbled, and as its previous climate commitments fell by the wayside. While many observers recognised that Germany’s self-imposed neoliberal straitjacket had become one of its biggest problems, efforts to break free were blocked, including by the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which had been instrumental in establishing the debt brake in the first place.Fortunately, the CDU has finally had a change of heart. The impetus was not the party’s electoral victory last month, but Donald Trump’s inversion of US foreign policy. As if US Vice-President JD Vance’s open disdain for Europe at the Munich Security Conference in February had not been bad enough, he and his boss then browbeat Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office, before rudely showing him the door.This dismaying spectacle prompted CDU leader Friedrich Merz, Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting, to proclaim that Europe must end its dependency on the United States. He is fully on board with establishing a new European security network and departing from Germany’s fiscal regime. On March 4, the CDU, together with its junior coalition partner, the Social Democrats, announced a softening of the debt brake. Germany will raise hundreds of billions of euros to invest in its neglected military and infrastructure.But as bold as this might sound, it falls well short of the obvious solution: scrapping the debt brake altogether. There is no reason to bind governments’ hands as they pursue necessary increases in military and infrastructure spending. Moreover, what will happen when future needs require still more investments, including for other purposes, but the supermajority needed for constitutional reforms lies beyond reach?The debt brake grew out of neoliberal distrust of government – and of the people who put governments in power. The more that power over money and finance can be moved from the people and their elected representatives to markets and independent agencies, the better.Obviously, this impulse is deeply anti-democratic, since it deprives the polity of one of its most formidable prerogatives: power over the public purse. Ironically, the German plaintiffs who have repeatedly tried to rein in the European Central Bank’s monetary policies, often with the blessing of Germany’s Constitutional Court, have made the same point when rallying against the ECB. And yet, German neoliberals openly embraced the anti-democratic impulse of the debt break.Fortunately, the Court of Justice of the European Union did not take the bait in these cases. If it had, the ECB would have been deprived of the power to loosen the money supply during financial and public-health crises. Worse, the combination of rigid fiscal and monetary policies would have left austerity as the only option – a recipe for the kind of political radicalisation that gave us Brexit.This brings us to a second taboo that needs to fall: the aversion to monetary financing. Widely disparaged as a recipe for inflation and irresponsible government, monetary financing has, in fact, helped many countries cope with huge, unexpected expenditures. In a paper on the “dysfunctional taboo” against monetary financing, Will Bateman of the Australian National University and Jens van ’t Klooster of the University of Amsterdam show that such occasions have included wars, financial crises, and pandemics.Curiously, the policy paper that Merz’s incoming government offered to support its proposed fiscal Zeitenwende makes no mention of monetary financing. It explains how the United Kingdom deprived itself of the capacity to mobilise effectively against Hitler’s Germany in the 1930s, because it prioritised fiscal prudence over defence capacity; but it says little about how the victorious powers financed the war. True, in the US, taxes went up, ordinary citizens bought war bonds, and financial intermediaries invested in Treasuries. But without the Federal Reserve buying significant amounts of US short-term debt and managing interest rates, these solutions would not have sufficed.The question, then, is whether the ECB is ready to backstop government-debt financing of investments in defence and other critical needs. Given governments’ difficulties raising taxes in a world of capital mobility, this will be crucial.Fortunately, the ECB has come a long way since the 2008 financial crisis and its aftermath, when it refused to refinance Irish and Greek debt. During the Covid-19 crisis, it proved its mettle by providing liquidity when no-one else could. Since these measures did not face serious challenges in court, the ECB should recognise that it has more policy and legal flexibility than it had previously.It took a pandemic and the threat of war to get here, but at long last Germany might be able to dispense with the two taboos – debt and monetary financing of budgets – that have strangled governments for decades. Rigid dogmatism should be replaced with more pragmatic management of fiscal and monetary affairs. This moment demands what economist Isabella M Weber of the University of Massachusetts calls “anti-fascist economic policy.” — Project Syndicate• Katharina Pistor, Professor of Comparative Law at Columbia Law School, is the author of The Code of Capital: How the Law Creates Wealth and Inequality.

The regional director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the Eastern Mediterranean, Dr Hanan Hassan Balkhy, has revealed that there is ongoing collaboration between the WHO and Qatar in numerous pioneering initiatives to advance critical health sectors in the Eastern Mediterranean.She highlighted that the initiatives include upgrading of health infrastructure and the enhancement of medical education to qualify medical practitioners, combat addiction, and improve emergency medicine.She hailed the significant support Qatar provides for the organisation's operations, whether in the Eastern Mediterranean or through WHO, or through direct support to nations.In conversation with Qatar News Agency (QNA) marking her visit to Doha, Balkhy emphasised that Qatar is a key supporter of the WHO's initiatives in the region, highlighting that her current visit intends to explore new fields of co-operation, along with the possibility of backing additional initiatives that contribute to beefing up public health in the region.She commended the positive role Qatar performs in this regard, as the nation has successfully hosted the 71st session of the WHO Regional Committee for the Eastern Mediterranean in Doha in 2024.The Sport for Health initiative launched by Qatar and WHO marking the hosting of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 was among the foremost successful initiatives, she underlined, emphasising WHO's desire to capitalise on the Qatari experience in the upcoming major tournaments.Balkhy pointed to the World Innovation Summit for Health (WISH), which Qatar has been hosting for many years, affirming that there is close collaboration between the organisation and WISH, as both sides strive to significantly bolster this initiative.Qatar plays a pivotal role in combating epidemics and infectious diseases, as well as strengthening health security at both the regional and global levels, she said, noting the collaboration includes financial and technical support for a substantial number of countries in the region.The figures of material support Qatar provides underscore its profound commitment to backing global health efforts, thereby bolstering the nations' capabilities in addressing a variety of health challenges, Balkhy stressed.She shone the spotlight on Qatar's efforts to support the Palestinian people, especially in the Gaza Strip, emphasising that the Qatar Red Crescent Society (QRCS) collaborated with WHO alongside the health group to distribute medical supplies to health facilities in Rafah, in addition to providing the QRCS's medical supplies to the Jerusalem field hospital, in support of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Rafah.In addition, Qatar hosted roughly 1,500 injured Palestinians who needed urgent medical care that was not available in Gaza, in co-ordination with the Palestinian Ministry of Health, WHO, and UNRWA, Balkhy highlighted, praising Qatar's role in providing treatment, including the fitting of prosthetics and medical rehabilitation for patients.She pointed out that there is significant co-operation between WHO and several Qatari entities such as QRCS, Qatar Charity, and Qatar Fund For Development (QFFD), which offer concrete efforts on the ground in support of humanitarian health issues.Balkhy, who assumed her position in early February 2024, underscored the importance of shoring up regional co-operation to navigate the health challenges faced by the regionShe reiterated that her visit to Doha primarily aims to extend gratitude to Qatar for its unwavering support for the region and WHO, particularly in the area of medical education, featuring meetings with several key players and officials to deliberate on an array of critical initiatives.The discussions revolved around new initiatives pertaining to providing healthcare, medical paraphernalia and medicines, in addition to enhancing medical security in the region, she said.She highlighted the latest initiatives being discussed with Qatar, including fostering emergency medicine programmes, augmenting the number of trained medical practitioners, and conducting scientific research on combating addiction.Qatar's experience in converting all its municipalities and educational cities into health cities can serve as a role model, she said.Balkhy highlighted the efforts being made to eradicate poliomyelitis, emphasising that Afghanistan and Pakistan are the only remaining countries worldwide where the wild poliovirus is still active. She stressed that reaching out to children in remote and mountainous areas, along with the security risks associated with these tasks, represents the formidable obstacle to eliminating the disease.She further noted that geographic challenges, rather than funding, are the primary impediment to the complete eradication of the disease in those two countries.Part of the visit to Qatar was dedicated to discussing avenues for backing these efforts, especially with respect to solidifying health infrastructure in remote areas to ensure fundamental vaccinations reach the children, she said.Balkhy added that she discussed with the officials in Qatar on bolstering emergency medicine through training health practitioners and hosting a strategic dialogue to augment their numbers in the region, in addition to collaborating in combating narcotics through scientific research and setting strategies that inhibit the proliferation of this phenomenon, which significantly affects the people's welfare and productivity.She lauded Qatar's experience in managing the Covid-19 pandemic, especially during the successful hosting of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.She underlined that WHO is determined to work side by side with the region's nations to strengthen health preparedness and alertness, acknowledging the existence of epidemics that necessitate taking appropriate precautions, such as quarantine and prevention, as the key to combating the potential prevalence of communicable diseases.Commenting on the health situation in the Gaza Strip, Balkhy highlighted that for two decades, Gaza had not registered any polio cases, but it is currently grappling with formidable health challenges due to the complete crumbling of infrastructure in the aftermath of the recent war.The menace of the resurgence of diseases includes the contamination of water and sewage on streets in the Strip, coupled with sharp reduction in vaccination rates since October 7, 2023, which led to the severe decline in children's immunity, she outlined.WHO had conducted an extensive polio vaccination campaign in Gaza last July, and despite the significant challenges, it was able to successfully conduct this campaign, she said adding that the organisation launched another campaign last month to curb the spread of the disease.Balkhy reiterated her special thanks to Qatar for its enduring support for the WHO's efforts. She extended her profound gratitude to Qatar and all its partners for their political, logistical, technical and material support whether through WHO, or through direct support to the region's nations.Such kinds of partnerships represent the sole way to rebuild the capacities of the Eastern Mediterranean and restore its health stature, she said. (QNA)

Britain’s government wants to tame its ballooning bill for supporting people with disabilities and long-term health conditions which, despite the cost, leaves many claimants distressed or struggling to find work.Annual spending on incapacity and disability benefits already exceeds the country’s defence budget and is set to top £100bn ($129bn) by 2030 according to official forecasts, up from £65bn now.Prime Minister Keir Starmer warned this week that the welfare arrangements he inherited from the previous government were “indefensible economically and morally” and he wanted to see more people back in work. His government is expected to propose changes next week.Broadcaster ITV has reported that the reform would include £6bn pounds of cuts, alarming some lawmakers from Starmer’s left-leaning Labour Party.Finance minister Rachel Reeves is keen to find ways to reduce the benefits bill as official forecasts due on March 26 may otherwise show the government will miss its debt-reduction goals.Welfare experts say the government will nevertheless struggle to ensure that a push for quick savings does not jeopardise longer-term efforts to boost employment.“Trust is very low,” said Louise Murphy, senior economist at the Resolution Foundation think tank, adding that many disabled people on benefits feared losing money or facing a tough time with a work coach if they considered employment.Asked about potential cuts, a spokesperson for Britain’s department for work and pensions said it had “a duty to put welfare spending on a more sustainable path ... through meaningful, principled reforms rather than arbitrary cuts to spending”.Chelsea Shubert, 23, is the type of person the government wants to encourage.Diagnosed with autism and living with anxiety, dyslexia and other conditions, she left school without key qualifications and received unemployment and disability benefits.In 2021, a government employment adviser urged her to do an unpaid six-month stint at a charity shop, which did not lead to a job.But she has now passed an English exam and began her first paid job as a school crossing guard in January.“It’s very rewarding and gets me out, even though it’s only half an hour in the morning and half an hour in the evening,” she said.Eventually she hopes to work with children for longer hours so she is not so reliant on benefits.“Being someone that’s living with a disability and a health condition, this world that we live in is horrible. There’s not enough support out there,” she said.Bad experiences with Britain’s benefits system are common, said Ben Baumberg Geiger, professor of social science and health at King’s College London.His recent study based on a survey of nearly 4,000 claimants found two in five felt they would be better off dead or wished to commit an act of self-harm.“We have a very dysfunctional benefit system that simultaneously is spending a lot of money ... and at the same time doesn’t feel like it’s providing support,” he said.While Britain’s unemployment rate is low by European standards at 4.4% of the workforce, 10% of the working-age population claim incapacity or disability benefits, up from about 8% before the Covid-19 pandemic.Other European countries have not seen the same rise, which analysts suggest may reflect the gap between the levels of unemployment and disability benefits in Britain.Most single jobless people get £393 a month plus some housing costs, while those deemed too sick to work receive £810.In addition, disabled people – in work or not – can receive a separate benefit averaging £586 a month to cover extra disability-related costs.The Resolution Foundation’s Murphy said the government was right to consider narrowing the gap between unemployment and incapacity benefits and whether regular lump-sum payments truly reflected extra costs caused by health conditions.But she was concerned tighter eligibility rules for future claimants could see the brunt of cuts borne by an unlucky minority of disabled people.Short-term budget pressures must not distract the government from getting more people back into work, Murphy said.Geiger said Britain might learn from countries like the Netherlands, where employers are liable for initial costs if a staffer is no longer able to work due to ill health, increasing their incentive to retain the worker.European countries with higher rates of employment for disabled people had achieved this through better working conditions rather than a benefits crackdown, he added.In Britain, fewer than one in 100 people receiving the higher rate of incapacity benefit return to work each month – half the proportion in 2012, according to the Resolution Foundation.One organisation which says it can help turn that round is the Shaw Trust, a charity which receives government contracts to prepare people with poor health to return to work or stay in their job by offering intensive, specialist support.This costs more than £2,000 per person and secures lasting employment for fewer than half those helped.But the charity says it delivers an average return on investment for the taxpayer of £2.42 per pound spent in the first year, rising to £9.22 after three years.The Shaw Trust’s chief commercial officer, Richard Clifton, hopes these figures ensure its work is spared from any public spending cuts.“In reality these programmes give you payback within the year,” he said.

Global oil supply could exceed demand by around 600,000 barrels per day this year, the International Energy Agency said on Thursday, due to growth led by the US and weaker than expected global demand.The outlook of ample supplies despite US sanctions on major exporters Russia and Iran highlights the challenge for Opec+, or the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries plus Russia and other allies, in balancing the market.“The US is currently producing at record highs and is forecast to be the largest source of supply growth in 2025,” the IEA, which advises industrialised countries, said in a monthly report.“The latest round of sanctions on Russia and Iran has yet to significantly disrupt loadings, even as some buyers have scaled back purchases.”Last month, the IEA had suggested a slightly narrower surplus of around 500,000 bpd, according to Reuters calculations based on the agency’s data.World oil demand is now expected to rise by 1.03mn bpd in 2025, the IEA said on Thursday, down 70,000 bpd from last month’s forecast, with growth driven largely by Asia and specifically China. “Asian countries will account for almost 60% of gains, led by China where petrochemical feedstocks will provide the entirety of growth as demand for refined fuels reaches a plateau.”Growing consumption of petrochemical feedstocks, the IEA added, accounts for almost all demand growth gains since the Covid-19 pandemic.Oil ticked lower after the report’s publication. Brent oil futures traded at $70.85 at 0926GMT, compared with $71.01 at 0900 when the report was published.The report highlights the headwinds Opec+ faces this year as growing global trade tensions could impact demand against a backdrop of robust supply growth.Opec+ decided earlier this month to start unwinding its most recent layer of output cuts from April. The 2025 surplus could grow by a further 400,000 bpd if Opec+ extends its unwinding of cuts and fails to rein in overproduction, the IEA said.“The macroeconomic conditions that underpin our oil demand projections deteriorated over the past month as trade tensions escalated between the US and several other countries,” the IEA said, prompting it to revise down its demand growth estimates for the fourth quarter of 2024 and the first quarter of 2025.In its own report on Wednesday, Opec kept its view for 2025 oil demand growth unchanged at 1.45mn bpd, and flagged a 363,000 bpd rise in Opec+ output in February led by Kazakhstan.The IEA sees 2025 global supply growth doubling relative to the 2024 pace of growth, to around 1.5mn bpd, assuming Opec+ does not unwind its cuts further beyond April.It added that Opec+ may actually only add around 40,000 bpd of oil to the market, less than the nominal 138,000 bpd April increase, from Saudi Arabia and Algeria, because overproduction from other member states leaves no room to open taps further.Global supply gains will be almost all driven by non-Opec growth, primarily the record US output as well as gains from Canada, Brazil and Guyana.Proposed US tariffs on Mexican and Canadian oil could impact flows, the IEA said, however it said it was too early to assess the impact given negotiations are ongoing, as well as a lack of clarity around the scope and scale of the measures.

South Korea’s birthrate, the lowest in the world, rose in 2024 for the first time in nine years, as more couples tied the knot after pandemic delays, and as policy efforts to incentivise companies and Koreans to embrace parenthood start to pay off. Nam Hyun-jin, 35, who had her second daughter last August, said she has seen a social shift, driven largely by the government’s broadened policy support and more companies joining the efforts. “The society as a whole is encouraging childbirth more than five years ago when we had our first child,” Nam said. And, more importantly, “it’s the company culture of encouraging childbirth that is providing huge help,” said Nam, whose employer – Booyoung – started to give out 100mn won ($70,000) from last year to its employees for childbirth bonus. That shift in societal norms could prove pivotal in a country that over the past decade has seen its birthrate plummet to the lowest in the world, as women prioritised career advancement over marriage or parenthood due to the rising cost of housing and raising a child. The stakes are high, as the demographic crisis has become the biggest risk to growth in Asia’s fourth-largest economy and its social welfare system, with the country’s population of 51mn on track to halve by the end of this century. In 2024, however, the glum statistics on South Korea’s fertility rate turned a corner. It rose to 0.75, still a global record-low, from 0.72 in 2023, after eight consecutive years of declines from 1.24 in 2015 despite billions of dollars spent by the country to try to reverse the trend. While the rise mostly reflected an increase from pandemic-disrupted marriages, other numbers suggest it could be more than just a Covid blip and that government policies are having an effect. Quarterly data showed the number of second newborns, such as Nam’s, jumped 12% in the second half of 2024, versus an 11% rise in first-born babies. “There is a high possibility of further rises (in fertility rate) in coming years, and we are right at the inflection point,” You Hye-mi, presidential secretary for population policy, told Reuters. Last year, now-impeached President Yoon Suk-yeol proposed a new ministry devoted to tackling the “national demographic crisis”, aiming for a broader approach from earlier years of less-effective cash-focused support. Interviews conducted by Reuters over the past week with policymakers, industry experts, economists and Korean mothers credited the government’s policy support – in three areas of work-family balance, childcare and housing – and a campaign to encourage business to incentivise employees on parenthood for the positive turn. The government plans to spend 19.7tn won ($13.76bn) in the three focus areas this year, up 22% from 2024. “Korea faces some of the world’s most challenging demographics. The government didn’t overstate the case when it declared a national demographic emergency in June,” says Kathleen Oh, Morgan Stanley’s chief Korea and Taiwan Economist. “The good news is that the sense of urgency appears real, with authorities moving toward structural reforms and away from short-term fixes.” Policy changes over the last year include employees being paid 100% of their salary for a maximum of six months, if both parents take parental leave, compared with a maximum of three months earlier. Additionally, the maximum period was extended to 1-1/2 years, from 1 year, if both parents take leave. Paternity leave has also been extended to a maximum of 20 days from 10 days. The government will pay employees at small and medium sized enterprises (SME) their wages during the leave. From this year, the government is making it mandatory for listed companies to include their childcare-related statistics in regulatory filings, with incentives for government projects and financial support for SMEs. The policies appear to be bearing fruit. In 2024, marriages rose even more sharply, at the fastest pace on record, after climbing in 2023 for the first time in 12 years on a post-pandemic boost. In last year’s government survey, 52.5% of South Koreans expressed positive views about marriage, the highest since 2014. “The government has prepared as much as it could at an institutional level, and now we need more companies embracing it,” said Shin Kyung-ah, sociology professor at Hallym University. Last year Booyoung saw a surge in childbirths among employees after the construction firm announced the bonus scheme. “After all, it is for companies to survive. We build apartments, and they will be sold only if there are enough people to live in,” said Kim Jin-seong, human resources director at Booyoung. Booyoung’s move was later followed by more incentives from the government, such as tax exemption on childbirth bonuses, and similar efforts by other companies, including game developer Krafton which is also planning a 100-mn-won scheme. “We need to make sure to keep the spark alive, which was hard to make, by quickly filling in the blind spots of low-birth policies, such as free-lancers and the self-employed,” Choi Sang-mok, the finance minister who is currently serving as acting president, said this month. For some, however, especially among the younger generation, the “spark” is missing. “I think it is not that welcomed, because it is difficult and costs a lot of money to get married, have a baby and family in the Korean society,” said Kim Ha-ram, 21, a student. South Korea’s last baby boom was in 1991-1996. It now aims to raise the fertility rate to 1 by 2030, which is still far below the rate of 2.1 needed for a steady population. Hallym University’s Shin sees South Korea’s temporary workers, the second-highest rate among Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development countries at 27.3%, compared with the average of 11.3%, as a demographic challenge. “The gap is huge between big and small companies in South Korea, and between those employed permanently and temporarily, so the government needs to be more creative to have the system established for all,” Shin said. Jung Jae-hoon, a professor of social welfare at Seoul Women’s University, endorsed Shin’s view that companies should do more to complement government efforts. “Childcare systems are well established now at a society level through government investments, but we still need companies to change to become more family-friendly, which makes it a job half done,” Jung said.

The Trump Administration’s tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China took effect on March 4, though some have been temporarily postponed since. Notably, the 25% tariff on imports from Canada and Mexico was subsequently granted a one-month exemption by President Trump of the United States. China responded swiftly, declaring its readiness for a tariff war or “any other type of war,” signalling its intent to retaliate decisively. As the world’s second-largest economy braces for countermeasures, global investors are preparing for prolonged economic turbulence marked by market volatility and financial uncertainty. Some prominent US economists, including Greg Howard, caution that the imposition of these tariffs could provoke retaliatory measures that may ultimately impact American consumers. Howard noted, “It will be interesting to see how the rest of the world responds. It has been a long time since we have seen trade wars of this scale, but historically, such disputes have led to widespread tariff increases across multiple industries and countries. This will not only affect US consumers but also American producers.” Market trends reflect growing investor concern. Global money market funds recorded a surge in inflows, with investors seeking safer assets in response to the United States’ decision to escalate its trade dispute. According to LSEG Lipper data cited by Reuters, global money market funds attracted $61.32bn in the week ending March 5, following net purchases of $39.55bn the previous week. Conversely, demand for global equity funds declined, reaching a four-week low as they secured only $2.97bn in inflows. US equity funds, in particular, experienced significant net outflows of approximately $9.54bn, while European and Asian funds saw strong inflows of $5.87bn and $5.83bn, respectively, during the same period. Despite the Trump Administration’s assertions that tariffs will bolster America’s economic position, the reality may prove more complex. Increased import costs force businesses to either absorb financial losses or pass them on to consumers, potentially driving inflation and reducing household purchasing power. Higher import costs often get passed on to consumers, increasing inflation in countries around the globe. Domestic businesses relying on imported materials also face higher costs, reducing profitability. Nigel Green, CEO of deVere Group, warns: “Tariffs are an act of economic warfare. This aggressive escalation could cause the most severe economic disruption since the global financial crisis, excluding the pandemic. “The fallout extends far beyond tariffs alone, with ripple effects threatening corporate profits, inflation rates, and supply chain stability. Trade barriers of this magnitude are not a pathway to strength; they are self-inflicted wounds that raise costs for businesses, dampen consumer spending, and weaken economic resilience.” Higher tariffs increase the cost of trade, reducing economic activity and slowing global GDP growth. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has repeatedly warned that trade wars reduce business confidence and investment, leading to slower expansion. Trade wars typically produce more economic drawbacks than advantages. While they may offer temporary protection to certain industries, ultimately they hinder global trade, increase costs, and generate uncertainty that weighs on economic growth. Given that the global economy is still recovering from the disruptions of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is ill-equipped to endure a tariff war at this juncture.

There has only been a marginal rise in the number of announced greenfield FDIs in the GCC in 2024, according to Emirates NBD.In a recent research, the bank said the number of greenfield FDIs in the GCC grew just under 1% to 1,830 in 2024 from 1,813 in 2023.Despite the low pace of growth, the number of new projects remains well above the pre-Covid average.There does, however, appear to have been a decline in the average project value across the GCC, with the total value of projects having fallen by 26% year-on-year (y-o-y) in 2024.The primary sources of FDI into GCC economies in 2024, on a value basis, included the US (25%), China (17%), the UK (9%) and India (9%).The UAE also made a material contribution to greenfield FDI in the rest of the GCC, accounting for 5% of announced projects in 2024. Sectors seeing the highest value of greenfield projects include communications (18%), renewables (14%), metals (8%), electronic components (8%), as well as coal, oil and gas (8%).Global FDI flows declined in 2024 in both value and volume. UNCTAD estimates that the number and value of announced greenfield FDI projects declined by 8% and 7% y-o-y respectively.Despite the annual decline, the value of greenfield project announcements remains high by historical standards because of several large-scale projects related to the manufacturing of semiconductors and AI technology.The UAE features as the source country for two of the top 10 projects by value of investment, including a real estate investment into Ras El-Hekma in Egypt by ADQ and an investment by Mubadala in semiconductor manufacturing in the US.While the aggregate value of greenfield projects fell in 2024, there were pronounced differences across geographical regions.Developed economies saw a 15% y-o-y rise in the value of announced greenfield projects, disproportionately driven by large increases in the value of projects in the US (+93% y/y) and the UK (+32% y/y).In contrast, developing economies in saw a 24% y-o-y decline in the value of announced greenfield projects, Emirates NBD noted.

As US President Donald Trump’s administration prepares to impose “reciprocal tariffs” on America’s trading partners, it is clear that firms can no longer assume that their business models will not be disrupted by new trade barriers – and even a full-blown trade war. Could this be the final nail in the coffin of globalisation?It is no secret that globalisation has been in retreat for a while. But as my co-authors and I show in a new paper, this process began earlier that many realise, with the 2008 global financial crisis (GFC) as the turning point. From 1990-2008 – call it the period of hyper-globalisation – trade, as a share of GDP, rose by more than one percentage point annually, on average. In 2000-07 alone, the share of total inputs advanced economies sourced from developing countries almost tripled. But after the GFC, this expansion ended abruptly, before reversing in 2011, and overall trade growth has since stagnated.The likely explanation for this change is relatively straightforward: the GFC was the first in a long series of negative shocks. In 2012, the eurozone faced a sovereign-debt crisis. In 2016, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. In 2018, Trump’s first administration launched a tariff campaign against major US trading partners, especially China (which continued under Joe Biden). In 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic began. In 2022, Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. And in 2024, Trump – the self-proclaimed “Tariff Man” – was elected for a second term.When trade uncertainty is high, so is risk – and that makes global value chains costly. If firms fear that new tariffs might make imports of key inputs more expensive, or that new trade barriers or other disruptions might prevent those inputs from arriving at all, they will question whether buying those items from foreign suppliers still makes sense. With rapid technological advances enabling the automation of a fast-growing range of tasks, they may well conclude that it does not.In this case, firms might “reshore” production, whether by increasing their reliance on domestic suppliers or by moving production in-house (vertical integration). We found that higher uncertainty in developing economies leads to significant increases in the share of inputs produced in high-income countries – but only in highly robotised industries. In industries where automation is less widespread or feasible, the cost of local labour appears to be prohibitive for many firms.We also found that, when reshoring, firms tend to favour vertical integration over dependence on domestic suppliers, whether because they want to exercise as much control as possible over their value chains – yet another hedge against uncertainty – or because it is too costly to source inputs from new suppliers. (Building relationships with suppliers typically involves investment, including the provision of knowledge and technology.) Small and medium-size firms are especially likely to take this route, as they generally lack the sprawling multinational networks that might facilitate a larger firm’s search for new suppliers.While firms in high-income countries engaged in some reshoring before the GFC, the reshoring response to uncertainty has more than tripled since 2008. The low-interest-rate environment that prevailed for over a decade after the GFC probably contributed to this shift – along with increased risk aversion and advances in automation technologies – by making investment in robots more attractive.Of course, reshoring is not the only possible response to uncertainty. Policymakers and consultancies often recommend that firms facing geopolitical, climate, or trade risks bolster supply-chain resilience by diversifying their input suppliers across locations, thereby limiting the impact of disruptions in one or more. But we find little evidence that firms heed this advice, largely because finding new suppliers is so costly. Moreover, some types of production are highly concentrated geographically. For example, rare-earth minerals and electric-vehicle batteries originate mostly in China.Another strategy for coping with uncertainty is nearshoring – relocating supply chains to nearby countries, especially friendly ones (friendshoring). But we find little evidence that firms are embracing this approach, either. On the contrary, in industries where automation is an option, countries have been reshoring even from neighbours with which trade barriers are unlikely to emerge. Germany is a case in point: far from shifting production to its fellow EU members in Central and Eastern Europe, where labour costs are lower, it has moved production from those countries back onto its own territory. US firms have also reshored production from Mexico – though, again, having the option to use robots, rather than expensive domestic labour, is essential.Since the GFC, rising economic, geopolitical, and climate risks, together with progress on automation, have fundamentally changed firms’ calculations regarding global value chains, with offshoring viewed as increasingly costly. While firms have reason to keep some production on foreign soil – if it cannot be automated at home – the reshoring trend is likely to accelerate, driven not least by Trump’s rapidly escalating trade war. Globalisation might not die, but it will never be the same. – Project SyndicateDalia Marin, Professor of International Economics at the School of Management of the Technical University of Munich, is a research fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research and a non-resident fellow at Bruegel.

What do Rachel Reeves, Javier Milei, and Elon Musk have in common? All are preaching the gospel of austerity as a necessary cure for what ails their respective economies.Hence, Reeves, the United Kingdom’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, has tightened rules for government spending and investment, despite the fact that fiscal constriction has been a major cause of the country’s problems over the past 15 years. Similarly, Milei has framed austerity as the price Argentina must pay for 20 years of overextension. He argues that defeating inflation is the only path to prosperity, even if doing so deepens an already deep well of poverty.And for Musk, the United States supposedly needs austerity to spare it from bankruptcy. This argument is just a ruse: states with sovereign currencies, especially the main global reserve currency, cannot go bankrupt. Musk’s obvious motivation for slashing public budgets is to make room for tax cuts, and to fire public employees who do not share his agenda.The last time we heard the drumbeat of austerity was during the global financial crisis. In the US, the prescribed response took the form of a milquetoast “sequester” (spending caps). But in Europe, the fiscal tightening went much further, destroying a decade’s worth of growth, undermining public investment, and contributing to many of the problems that the continent is still struggling with today.What was obviously a failure of private finance was rechristened a crisis of runaway state spending. Bilateral loans to the European Union’s periphery states were little more than disguised bailouts of core countries’ banks “paid for” by fiscal contractions. Those offering elaborate arguments about the expansionary power of fiscal tightening were denying the obvious: When the private sector is trying to save and the public sector does the same, the economy inevitably will shrink, and the debt stock will grow larger as a share of GDP.This was the essence of Europe’s self-defeating experiment with austerity in the 2010s. By 2016, even the European Commission had begun to change its tune; and by the time that Covid-19 had struck, the days of “growing the economy by shrinking it” seemed to be over. How wrong we were.As John Quiggin argued at the time, austerity is a zombie idea: It cannot be killed, because it is immune to empirical refutation. The wisdom of the Covid crisis – when the sound response was to bail out the economy in the face of a global shutdown – thus became another “runaway debt crisis” that threatens to bankrupt the state.Back in the 2010s, austerity in the EU was supposed to stabilise public finances by “restoring confidence” in the bond market. But cutting spending when the economy was already in recession simply compounded the problem. Fear of inflation owing to “all that spending” quickly turned into fear of deflation and declining confidence. Austerity in a recession simply produces more recession and unemployment. We have known that since the Bruning Chancellorship in Weimar Germany.But what about austerity under other conditions? The current cases of the US and Argentina are interesting in this regard. For its part, the US is nowhere near a recession. The economy is powering ahead and facing inflationary pressures. In addition to freeing up fiscal space for tax cuts, another possible explanation for pursuing austerity under such conditions concerns geopolitics and global imbalances.When Joe Biden took office in early 2021, he kept most of Donald Trump’s tariffs in place and embarked on a path of “green” reindustrialisation. Now that Trump is back in power, he is raising tariffs further to force adjustments in exporting economies, and replacing Biden’s green reindustrialisation strategy with a fossil-fuelled approach.But this isn’t the whole story. Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are pursuing the long-held Republican (and libertarian) dream of dismantling the modern administrative state. They would much prefer the nineteenth-century state, which used tariffs both to protect domestic industry and raise government revenue. The implication is that Silicon Valley’s tech lords will reprise the role played by the robber barons during the Gilded Age. Thus, austerity is being dusted off for a whole new set of purposes.Argentina, by contrast, faces permanent high inflation without real (inflation-adjusted) GDP growth. More than a dozen stabilisation plans have come and gone, and Milei has achieved what seemed impossible: a broad electoral coalition in favour of austerity.Milei owes his success (so far) to the distributional politics of permanent inflation. The Peronists lost their long hold on the poor and the working class because these are the voters who spend the greatest share of their incomes on consumption, and rising prices consistently eroded their purchasing power.The Peronist coalition managed to shelter unions from inflation by indexing wages accordingly, and the professional classes sheltered themselves with US dollar holdings. For a while, this arrangement was sufficient for Peronists to win elections. But those without these protections suffered falling consumption, and poverty increased year after year. Milei offered a way out. He would embrace austerity, destroy the Peronist networks, disrupt the middlemen, and deregulate everything. It would hurt for a while, but it would crush inflation and destroy Peronist insiders’ ability to protect themselves. Their pain would be your gain. Thus, austerity has become a form of schadenfreude politics, much like the war on federal employees and other “elites” in the US.Will it work? In Argentina, if the point is to defeat inflation despite rising poverty, then yes, it is working. But it will be electorally sustainable only if lower inflation leads to more investment and rising real wages. If it leads to ever deeper poverty for those who voted for it, Milei will lose his base.In the US, if the goal is to dismantle the administrative state, austerity will work. But in a country where 53% of counties – most of them Republican-leaning – are dependent on government transfers for a quarter or more of their incomes, it may backfire badly. Still, if Republicans get $4tn worth of tax cuts for the top 10%, the scheme might just be worth it.Austerity is back, but this time it is not just a bad idea. It is also a political weapon and a dangerous redistributive tool. — Project SyndicateMark Blyth, Professor of International Economics and Director of the Rhodes Centre for International Economics and Finance at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University, is the co-author (with Nicolò Fraccaroli) of the forthcoming Inflation: A Guide for Users and Losers and the author of Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea.