It is true that we invest millions in education from kindergarten to tertiary levels yet we still have some way to go to solve the skill mismatch in particular sectors. Since Independence, we clamour for a higher cohort of trained workers with skills involving science, engineering and maths (STEM) yet facts show that we have not yet achieved our targets in higher technical education.Įach year, our political leaders share with us their sacred creeds to turn the island into a Utopia where they promise us to build a platform for collaboration between government, industries and individuals to train workers in cutting-edge technology.
#PENT UP DEMAND COVID FULL#
During the lull in productive activity caused during the 16 months of this pandemic, it was our duty to reap full advantage of idle time and use this for the training of workers.įor many years, we had finance ministers promising us to give top priority to further education. It is obvious that for a nation with no natural resources, we all concur that our unique cohort of workers have to be trained to reach a higher level of prowess. This issue needs to be properly addressed. These facilities were battered by closing and re-opening of schools during the past year. Surely another critical issue is the havoc wrecked on our educational sector by the pandemic. Politicians are keen to put the pandemic behind them and set the date for a general election (latest date July 2022). Again, in the case of employees which survived solely on receiving the furlough rate (since the employer had no income) it is debatable if JobsPlus should treat such workers as gainfully employed.īack to the issue of subdued domestic demand, an improvement can be compared to a fulcrum that is expected to positively start an economic Renaissance at the end of the year. The latter was administered by Malta Enterprise and we heard frequent reminders that there are 100,000 (almost 50% of non-state employees) assisted in the furlough scheme.ĭefinitely, as employers were subsidized under the scheme there were fewer layoffs although as can be seen later in this article there were segments such as retail and small manufacturing which were faced with acute cash flow shortage and laid off workers. The main trust of the present administration was the maintenance of low unemployment and supplementing of a controlled wage subsidy. Politicians tend to underplay the importance of local demand when they seek to placate the worried electorate that their jobs are on line. What was seen as the Cinderella factor is a severe drop in domestic demand. Many point to a disruption in the global supply chain. One may ask what contributed to this sudden economic contraction other than the decimation of the tourist sector there was matched with declining net exports.
A positive prognosis by the Central Bank is that 2019 GDP levels are to be recouped towards the end of 2022, conditional on the successful rollout of a vaccine in 2021. Certainly, nothing like the stellar growth reached in the “L-Aqwa Zmien” years so cherished by party apologists under the ex -Joseph Muscat administration.
The furlough schemes may have felt like a sick patient being fed nutrients through a drip bottle leaving it with little energy to wake up and start functioning in a normal way.Ĭlose to home, we read the recent commentary issued by the Central Bank of Malta confirming (as if this in doubt) that as a result of the pandemic, it estimated a contraction of 8.2% in 2020, in gross domestic product (GDP).īoldly, it predicts that there will be a rebound this year and is expecting a healthy 5% growth followed by 5.5% in 2022, and 4.7% in 2023. This is an optimist view shared by many small and medium sized companies that have just sailed through a lockdown or a restrictive curfew which saw their revenues drop considerably.
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