tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-183260952024-03-20T22:23:28.483-04:00Voice and noiseThis is where I guard the details of my one and only bookPer Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-1152386276789840812006-08-31T15:17:00.000-04:002019-01-06T12:03:55.972-05:00My book<div align="center">
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<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3980/1281/1600/Bookcover.1.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3980/1281/400/Bookcover.0.jpg" style="cursor: hand; display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center;"> </a><br />
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<span style="font-size: 130%;">You can find it here: </span><br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1419620827/"><span style="font-size: 130%;">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1419620827/</span></a></div>
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<span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 130%;"><strong>And if YOUR voice is noisy enough:</strong></span></div>
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<span style="color: #3333ff;"><strong>at</strong> </span><a href="http://www.thebookstoreofyourchoice.com/ref/"><strong>http:/www.thebookstoreofyourchoice.com/ref/</strong></a></div>
<div align="center">
<span style="color: #3333ff;"><strong>/perkurowski's/splendid/voiceandnoise/bestseller</strong></span></div>
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Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-1144841039755330232006-08-30T07:17:00.058-04:002024-03-20T19:02:13.113-04:00THE CONTENTS OF VOICE AND NOISE<div><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><a name="_Toc114024182"></a><a name="_Toc114025537"></a><a name="_Toc117136239"></a><a name="_Toc117138018"></a><a name="_Toc117174800"></a><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/in-search-of-title.html" name="_Toc117692413" target="_blank"><span>In search of a title</span></a><b style="color: black;"><span><o:p></o:p></span></b></p></span></span></div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span><strong><em>Introduction</em></strong></span><br /></span>
The World Bank Group? (WBG)/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/the-executive-directors-eds.html" target="_blank">The Executive Directors?</a>/ The Nongovernmental Organizations?/ The Millennium Development Goals?/ 205 Development Topics! —listed on the World Bank Web site</span><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>My ED trips 1</em></strong></span><br /></span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><span>Airport #1/ Airport #2/ </span><b><span>An encounter with NGOs / </span></b><b style="text-align: center;"><span>Market driven visas? / </span></b><b style="text-align: center;"><span>Quality certifications! / </span></b></span></div><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b>The First Country [Vietnam]:</b> Gender; A rural road to the town; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/motorbikes.html">Motorbikes</a>; Are we few track minded?; Death penalty for corruption!; A luxurious hospital / <b>The Second Country </b>/ <b>Airport #3</b>/ <b>The Third Country</b> [Samoa]: <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2010/05/samoaas-far-as-you-can-go.html">As far as you can go</a> / <b>The fourth country</b> [Tanzania]: <a href=" Questions and answers" target="_blank"><span style="color: #c27ba0;">Honorable Accountability</span></a><span style="color: #674ea7;">; </span><a href=" Questions and answers" target="_blank"><span style="color: #c27ba0;">Strategic Plan</span></a>; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/trains-and-privatizations.html" target="_blank">Trains and privatizations</a>; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/environmental-disasters.html" target="_blank">Environmental disasters</a>; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/aids-vs-malaria.html" target="_blank">AIDS vs. Malaria</a>; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/questions-and-answers.html" target="_blank">Questions and answers</a> / <b>A fifth country—while an ED but not as one. [China]</b>: <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/a-fifth-countrywhile-ed-but-not-as-one.html" target="_blank">The Chinese of China</a> / <b>Small memories from my Central America</b>: <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/visas.html" target="_blank">Visas</a>; <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/global-info-confusion.html" target="_blank">Global info confusion</a>; <span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/the-new-frontiers-of-product-development.html" target="_blank">The new frontiers of product development</a>; </span><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2004/11/the-social-contract-of-teotihuacan.html" target="_blank">The social contract of Teotihuacan</a> / <b>Small memories from my transitional hometown:</b> <span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/assaulted.html" target="_blank">Assaulted</a> /<a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/washington-and-gps-global-positioning.html" target="_blank"> </a></span><span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/washington-and-gps-global-positioning.html" target="_blank">Washington and the GPS (Global Positioning System)</a> / <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2003/02/snowing-in-washington-my-first.html" target="_blank">Snowing in Washington</a></span><span style="text-align: center;"> / </span><span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/this-would-never-have-happened-to-john.html" target="_blank">This would never have happened to John Wayne</a> /<a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/a-monument-to-transparency.html" target="_blank"> </a></span><span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/a-monument-to-transparency.html" target="_blank">A monument to transparency</a> / </span><span style="text-align: center;"><b>A photo album</b></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium; text-align: center;"><br /></span></span></div><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><em><span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong>The Debt Sustainability Analysis 23</strong></span></em><br />
Why was it such an issue for me?/ A word of caution about Financial Leverage/ An Unsustainable Sustainability/ Odious Debt/ Odious Credit</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>BASEL—Regulating for what? 37</em></strong></span><br /><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/puritanism-in-banking.html" target="_blank">Puritanism in banking</a>/ A warning/ About the Global Bank Insolvency Initiative/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/05/some-comments-at-risk-management.html" target="_blank">Some comments at a Risk Management Workshop for Regulators</a>/ Let the Bank Stand Up/ BASEL and microfinance/ The mutual admiration club of firefighters in Basel/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/towards-countercyclical-basel.html" target="_blank">Towards a counter cyclical Basel?</a>/ A new breed of systemic errors</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>The debate about using Country Systems 55</em></strong></span><br />
Why did I spend so much time on this issue?/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/let-them-bike.html" target="_blank">Let them bike</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/about-el-zamorano-and-use-of-country.html" target="_blank">About El Zamorano and the use of country systems</a>/ <a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2006/05/lost-in-water-of-globalization.html" target="_blank">Lost in the water of globalization</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>My very private fight for better privatizations 65</em></strong></span><br />
Where do I come from?/ Transmission and Distribution—T & D/ Electricity for Brazil—and Isla de Margarita what?/ Pay now and pray for the light/ Hit in the head by the SENECA sale/ The present value and short circuits/ Reform fatigue opportunities/ Fiscal Space—Public or Private</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>About indexes and their disclosure 83</em></strong></span><br /><span style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/about-indexes-and-their-disclosure.html" name="_Toc125943957" style="text-align: center;" target="_blank">About indexes and their disclosure</a> </span>/ <a href="http://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/the-riskiness-of-country-risk.html" target="_blank">The Riskiness of Country Risk</a> / <a href="http://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/disclosing-ida-country-performance.html" target="_blank">Disclosing the IDA Country-Performance Ratings</a> </span><span style="font-size: large;">/ </span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">US GAO Report</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>A bit on some other indexes 95</em></strong></span><br /><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2004/08/the-through-eye-of-needle-index.html">The through-the-eye-of-the-needle index</a>/ The index of perceived Corruption/ Today, let us talk about the bribers/ A dangerously failed index/ How good or bad is your municipality?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">EIR & Environment 107</span></em></strong><br />
My answer to the NGOs/ The Amazon/ <a href="http://ourpiedaterre.blogspot.com/2006/05/our-quixotic-windmills.html" target="_blank">Our quixotic windmills</a>/ Earth, the cooperative/ A better alternative than a hybrid</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">Oil 121</span></em></strong><br />
About an Oil Market Update/ It’s an oil boom, stupid!/ Kohlenweiss 1979/ The search for transparency in an oil-consuming world/ We need the world price of gasoline (petrol)/ Sovereignty/ The Oil Referendum/ Why do they point their finger only at us?/ About accountability in energy planning</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>Trade, agriculture, services, and growth 135</em></strong></span><br />
On the road to Cancun…with new proposals/ Place us next to something profitable…/ Time to cover up?/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/04/an-encore-on-nudism-and-wto-negotiations.html" target="_blank">An encore on nudism and WTO negotiations</a>/ Hosting the spirit of free trade/ Time to scratch each other’s backs/ Of Mangos and Bananas/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/06/local-strawberries-in-season.html">Local strawberries in season</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>About remittances and immigration 147</em></strong></span><br />
The nature of remittances/ Remittance fees: The tip of the tip of the tip of the iceberg/ What GDP?/ Family Remittances/ Some notes on the securitization of remittances/ Safeguarding resources/ <a href="https://theamericanunion.blogspot.com/2006/07/scaling-up-imagination-about.html" target="_blank">Scaling up imagination about immigration</a>/ <a href="https://theamericanunion.blogspot.com/2006/07/the-skin-of-united-states.html" target="_blank">The Skin of the United States</a>/ <a href="https://theamericanunion.blogspot.com/2006/07/de-facto-usa-enlargement.html" target="_blank">A de-facto USA enlargement</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<em><strong><span style="color: #fcff01;">About cross-border services and emigration 165</span></strong></em><br />
The prisoners, the old, and the sick/ A wide spectrum of services for the elderly/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/05/the-ethics-of-solving-shortage-of.html">The ethics of solving the shortage of caretakers</a>/ Are we truly a World Bank?/ Get moving!</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><em><strong>Intermission…Out of the box tourism 173</strong></em></span><br /><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/lessons-from-florence.html" target="_blank">Lessons from Florence</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/a-niche-in-crookedness.html" target="_blank">A niche in crookedness?</a>/<a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/dead-and-useful.html" target="_blank"> Dead and Useful</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/adventure-fiscal-tourism.html" target="_blank">Adventure tourism</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/vanity-tourism.html" target="_blank">Vanity tourism</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/guaranteed-boring.html" target="_blank">Guaranteed boring</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">On our own governance 181</span></em></strong><br />
A real choir of voices/ Voices, Board Effectiveness, and 60 Years/ WB-IMF Collaboration on Public Expenditure issues/ The Normal Distribution Function is missing/ Board Effectiveness and the ticking clock/ WBG’s fight against corruption/ The Annual Meetings Development Committee Communiqué/ Hurrah for the Queen/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/05/diversity.html" target="_blank">Diversity</a>/ About the board and the staff/ A very local World Bank or…the not in my backyard syndrome</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><span><em><strong>Budgets & Costs 193</strong></em></span><br /></span>
On the urgency and the inertia of our business/ Medium Term Strategy and Finance Plan/ Unbudgeted costs/ Budget tools/ The remuneration of our President/ About our central travel agency</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><em><strong>Reshuffling our development portfolio 201</strong></em></span><br />
Let us scale up the IFC/ An encore on the BIG capital increase for IFC/ The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency—MIGA</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em><span>On some varied homespun issues 209</span></em></strong><br /></span>
The Poverty Reduction Strategy/ There should be life beyond 2015/ There should be new life beyond HIPC/ We need to make more transparent our harmonization/ Transparently Understandable Debt Management/ The Financial Sector Assessment Handbook —a postscript/ Too sophisticated/ About the addiction of guarantees to Municipalities/ About risks and the opportunities/ Financial Outlook and Risks</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>Some political incorrect Private-Sector Issues 219</em></strong></span><br />
Is the private sector the same private sector everywhere?/ Private vs. local investors/ Some thoughts about financial good governance/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/what-is-lacking-in-sarbanes-oxley-act.html" target="_blank">What is lacking in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.</a>/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/too-well-tuned.html" target="_blank">Too well tuned?</a>/ Alternative Millennium Development Goals</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">Communications 225</span></em></strong><br />
Communications in a polarized world/ Some other global communication issues/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/06/red-and-blue-or-red-or-bluea-postscript.html" target="_blank">Red and blue, or, red or blue?—a postscript</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">Some admittedly lite pieces 237</span></em></strong><br />
The World Bank Special/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/thou-shall-not-powerpoint.html" target="_blank">Thou shall not PowerPoint</a>/ Deep pondering on labels/ <a href="http://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2009/05/to-write-or-not-to-write-by-hand.html" target="_blank">To write or not to write…by hand</a>/ Three bullets on punctuality</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">On common goods and some global issues 247</span></em></strong><br />
Towards World Laboratories/ Daddy…the original or the copy?/ The rights of intellectual property user/ Who can enforce it better?/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/06/moises-naims-illicita-postscript.html" target="_blank">Moisés Naím’s Illicit</a>—a postscript/ Global Tax/ Labor standards and Unions</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em><span>A mixed bag of stand-alone issues 259</span></em></strong><br />
<a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/my-insecurities-about-social-security.html"><span style="color: #fcff01;">My insecurities about the social security debate</span></a>/</span> About the SEC, the human factor, and laughing/ Roping in the herd/ A paradise of customs illegalities/ Human genetics made inhuman/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/05/justice-needs-to-begin-with-just.html" target="_blank">Justice needs to begin with just prisons - McPrisons</a>/ Real or virtual universities?/ Brief thoughts on Europe/ Some spins on the US economy/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/06/is-inflation-really-measuring-inflation.html" target="_blank">Is inflation really measuring inflation?</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<strong><em><span style="color: #fcff01;">My Venezuelan blend 283</span></em></strong><br />
A Proposal for a New Way of Congressional Elections/ Let’s all whakapohane!/ We enjoyed/ Hugo, the Revolution, and I/ April 11-13, 2002/ To the opposition/ Synthesizing my current messages to my fellow countrymen/ 167-to-0—a postscript/ What is the financial world to do with Venezuela?/ Massachusetts, please show some dignity!/ <a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2023/11/colombia-venezuela.html" target="_blank">Colombia & Venezuela</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><em>My Farewell Speech on October 28, 2004 299</em></strong></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b>
<span><strong><em>Did the Minister do right? 305</em></strong></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b>
<span><strong><em>And now what? 307</em></strong></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b>
<span><strong><em>The President’s succession 309</em></strong></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(252, 255, 1);"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></span>
My thoughts on the issue/ The OK Corral and the World Bank/ A letter to an another new American World Bank President</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<em><strong><span style="color: #fcff01;">On some current books, a movie, and a future book 315</span></strong></em><br />
The World’s Banker by Sebastian Mallaby/ The End of Poverty by Jeffrey Sachs/ The Elusive Quest for Growth by William Russell Easterly/ The World Is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman/ The Pentagon’s New Map by Thomas P. M. Barnett/ And the Money kept Rolling In (and Out) by Paul Blustein/ Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins/ The Constant Gardener and the UN/ The future very last book about Harry Potter</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><em><strong><span>My book, Amazon’s profits and the value of its shares 325</span></strong></em></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b>
<em><strong><span>The last items in my outgoing tray 329</span></strong></em></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: #fcff01;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span>
Pray for us, Karol/ We must aim higher!<br />
<span style="color: #fcff01;"><em><strong>List of my fellow passengers who also dined at the captains table 333</strong></em><br />
<em><strong><a href="https://voiceandnoise.blogspot.com/2006/08/a-too-long-cv-or-too-short-memoir-and.html" target="_blank">A too long C.V. or a too short memoir, and acknowledgements 337</a></strong></em></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(252, 255, 1); font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></span><div><em style="color: #fcff01;"><strong><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">Some more blurring details about the MDGs 349</span></strong></em></div><div><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(252, 255, 1); font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></span><div><span style="color: #fcff01; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">
<em><strong>Shutting down 353</strong></em></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"><span style="color: #fcff01;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(252, 255, 1);"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></span>
Keep in touch/ The Buck Stops Here</span></div></div></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-64532305328012966162006-08-30T01:30:00.001-04:002022-04-07T13:45:22.450-04:00 In search of a title<p style="text-align: center;"><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">1/24th</span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">By<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">One of twenty four Executive Directors of the World Bank Group<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">November 2002–October 2004<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Some respectfully irreverent questions and suggestions about a great multilateral financial public-sector institution that the world needs more than ever to be a lean and mean poverty-fighting machine and that at sixty years of age should perhaps be renewing its vows in order to move up from “knowledge” into wisdom and instead of trying to advance impossible agenda like justice and social responsibility might do better settling for fights much easier to monitor against injustices and social irresponsibility … all made by a perhaps a somewhat naive but very well-intentioned former executive director equipped only with his long private-sector experience, and his willingness to speak out … sort of.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Or<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: 11pt;">HAVE THINK-TANK, WILL TRAVEL<o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Or<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: 11pt;">ANOTHER MOUSE WHO TRIED TO ROAR<o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Or<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Mr. KUROWSKI GOES TO WASHINGTON</span></b><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> (My daughter’s suggestion)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Or<br /><b>VOICE AND NOISE<o:p></o:p></b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">That’s it!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; text-align: justify;"> </span></p><p class="MsoTitle" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-weight: bold; margin: 0in; text-align: center;">VOICE AND NOISE<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Having an opinion and voicing it is what Voice is all about. Putting together thousands of perfectly pure voices might synthesize into a harmonious symphony but, without some noise, it will never ring true and that is what Noise is all about.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">The world I remember when I was young moved forward on carrots and hope in the belief that it was going to be a better place, while today’s drivers are more the sticks and despairs of those looking only to hang onto what they’ve got.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">To stand a chance of a better tomorrow, we need the Voice to recreate our dreams but also the Noise to make us want them come true. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">A shrinking world that makes isolation impossible presents the human race with the challenge of really having to get along. If we resist facing this challenge, the world will be a much-saddened place: let me get off. However, if on the contrary we truly try to make it work, we will at least have some beautiful dreams again.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">This book with all its simplicities and contradictions is but an effort to put my voice and noise on the table. All yours are needed too.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">P.S. After having decided on the title I found on the Web an article by Ingo R. Titze, Ph.D., titled “<a href="https://www.academia.edu/1057513/A_Century_of_Microphones_The_Implications_of_Amplification_for_the_Singer_and_Listener" target="_blank">Noise in the Voice</a>” that originally appeared in the 2005 May/June issue of the Journal of Singing. It reassures me a lot, as it argues that “A little noise, turned on at the right time, can go a long way toward enlarging the interpretive tool."<o:p></o:p></span></p>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-65833961961961610392006-08-30T01:29:00.002-04:002024-03-19T11:11:57.133-04:00The Chinese of China<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">
I traveled to China and was mesmerized. I assure you that, as a leisure trip, if you manage to get a bargain-priced ticket, there is nothing like it. When visiting the Great Wall of China, I took a local bus with only Chinese passengers, who sang in Chinese with the help of a karaoke-style video that underscored each Chinese character. But more than all these, for me everything was Chinese.</span></div>
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Nowadays in China, the majority of families have just one child. What does this mean to society? Could Latin families retain their characteristic traits with families of just one offspring? </span></div>
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It is precisely when a country is getting out of poverty and seeks to position itself in an intermediate level that any improvement, such as going from a bicycle to a motorcycle and from a motorcycle to a car demands a tremendous amount of energy. Is there enough energy and oil in the world to satisfy China’s growth? </span></div>
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China’s current model for economic growth seems to be taking the country in record time from being a rural country to a country where its citizens are all sardine-like packed in gigantic cities, and we presume that such a move is not good or sustainable. When we observe that recent cutting-edge technological advances in the world allow even the most isolated countryman to be present, almost live, right in the center of the Empire’s capital, we have to ask ourselves, are there really no other better and newer options? </span></div>
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China’s present growth rate is colossal, and from what we can gather there will be great disparities among those who get on board today’s developed consumerism and those who lag behind with no chance of having even a peek at this new millennium. Any progress entails risks and may even require leaving behind some victims in its passing, but if injustices turn out to be too vast then those passed by are sure to complain. Could China achieve in some decades what previously took centuries to achieve, and still be China? </span></div>
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Please forgive my political indiscretion, but in the early morning just as the red flags were hoisted in Tiananmen Square and I saw how human masses were mobilized and kept in certain order only when instructed by the guards’ blaring voices, I, discreetly, had to ask myself whether it could be possible to run China in the long run just like current à la mode democracies.</span></div>
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Finally, while climbing the Great Wall aboard a little yellow cart that looked just like an old and retired Disney theme park ride trying to make its way slowly through the crowds, I kept asking myself, will it withstand?</span></div>
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<a href="https://radicaldelmedio.blogspot.com/2004/02/lo-chino-de-la-china.html"><span style="font-size: medium;">From El Universal, Caracas, February 12, 2004</span></a></div>
Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-13696840063574163682006-08-18T10:20:00.005-04:002023-10-09T10:34:06.941-04:00Disclosing the IDA Country-Performance Ratings<div style="text-align: justify;">The World Bank manages a very large pool of donated development resources from the International Development Agency, IDA. To allocate these resources among the countries and also to decide whether these resources should be given out as loans or grants, they use a methodology that reviews many different variables and ends up in a product known as CPIA. These Country Performance Index Assessments had previously been disclosed in a sort of fussy way (with countries being classified in quintiles), but now there was strong pressure from most of the donors that these Country Performance Index figures should be disclosed in much more detail—I guess to reward the good countries and shame the others. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Nothing wrong with that, except if you thought that those performance indexes, though probably a good approximation of the reality, did not reflect all the difficult aspects of development and could also, if taken on their own and erroneously interpreted, make development more difficult. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I had had enough with organizations publishing indexes that were later appropriated by the selfish interests of others, making them mean more than they really do, without the originator responding clearly enough—as it was honored just by the attention given to its index and did not want to hurt a member of its fan club. And so the table was set to ignite my devil’s advocate genes. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>A first round of comments</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As so many of us invest much of our hopes for a better tomorrow in achieving a more transparent society, it is important that we always remind ourselves that there is nothing so nontransparent as a half-truth, said at the wrong time, at the wrong place, and not in a fully comprehensible way.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But, in a world that frequently demands that information be transmitted through easily digestible means, such as oversimplified rankings, we would rather have the World Bank (WB) doing it than any of the many not-accountable-to-anyone rating agents that frequently pursue undisclosed agenda. That said, it is not an easy decision for the WB to get into the rating game, and much care is needed. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is by definition an impossible task to compress in an adequate way all the very complex realities of a country into a simple index or rating, and in doing so it is absolutely certain that many mistakes will be made. On the other hand, one also needs a simple, comprehensive and understandable tool to be able to convey results powerfully, and a simple index or rating can do just that. The balancing of all the various elements and contradictions needs to be done with much concerned carefulness. If a minor agent such as an NGO would go wrong, there might not be much to it but if it is the knowledge Bank that puts forward the impreciseness, this could be leveraged into extremely negative consequences.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If we were to use only the term of an “IDA Resource Allocation Index” this would make the whole disclosure more transparent and honest, as this would indicate that when monitoring results and performance, it takes two to tango, the evaluated and the evaluator, and anyone—or both—could make mistakes. We should ban, forever, the use of the very arrogant and error-prone term “Country Performance Ratings.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Friends, it is just because we believe in disclosure that we should strive to find the right disclosure.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Development alchemy</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Somewhere in the documentation the “Weighting Procedure” is described as taking four parts of CPIA and one part of ARPP (I don’t remember what ARPP stands for but I guess that is not so important either) and multiplying this by a “governance factor that is calculated by dividing the average rating of these seven criteria by 3.5 (the midpoint of the 1—6 rating scale) and applying an exponent of 1.5 to this ratio.” Friends, whatever it means, this sounds just too much like a “Potteresque” development alchemy that even a studious Hermione would find difficult to understand. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Excuse the jest, my colleagues, but we could encounter some serious risks to our reputation. For instance, the Credit-Rating Agencies—at least with respect to sovereign credits—refuse to describe their methodology in too much detail, and they officially justify this refusal by stating that they do not wish the countries to know about how to get a great rating—although I truly suspect that they just don’t want to be called on their bluff. In our case we might be expected to come up with a more substantial explanation than the mixing of the potion above—and what if we can’t? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Confusion</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I have heard that “ratings should depend on actual policies, rather than intentions,” which sounds quite right, especially remembering that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. However, I have also heard that “the criteria are focused on policies and institutional arrangements, the key elements that are within the country’s control, rather than on actual outcomes.” Simplifying arithmetically both possibilities, it would seem to me that we could end up with a rating system that depends on policies rather than results. This, although perhaps quite acceptable to a private charity, seems a bit out of place for the World Bank. But then again, I might just be confused.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>About the Panel of Experts</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Dear Colleagues,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">With respect to the Terms of Reference (TR) for the Panel of Experts—I would like to make the following brief comments.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">To begin with, I believe we should avoid qualifying the panel as a “Panel of Experts,” as clearly the whole issue of rating, in this case of development adequacy, is governed by subjectivities and not by that kind of know-how that permits anyone to represent himself or herself as an “expert” without being deemed presumptuous. A reference to “experts” may also convey an unearned sense of precision that might backfire.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Reading through our methodology manual, we understand that if the Panel is to review whether the criteria used in the ranking provide an adequate basis to asses the quality of policies and institutions and, at the same time, the quality referred to means the degree to which a country’s framework is conducive to growth and poverty reduction, then, in all logic, it would seem that the Panel is supposed to review the whole effectiveness of the current development strategy of IDA. Although this could perhaps be a welcome exercise we find it hard, if not again presumptuous, to believe that it could be done during just 48 hours in March, unless of course the Panel is just called to apply freely any preconceptions of their own.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Frankly, when I thought about a panel in this matter, I never visualized a team able to reconstruct or even evaluate a methodology and a ranking that have been developed over many years, and I believe that for that purpose we already have other more appropriate procedures that we are already paying for and that work fulltime. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">No, I thought we were talking of a Panel that could advise us on how to design and communicate and control the interpretations of the rankings, so as to maximize their potential benefits and minimize the risks, for all, of this extremely hazardous activity.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The questions for such a panel are almost infinite; for instance, how do we make sure that the ratings are not used for any wrong purpose, which could even conspire against our development mission? Is the ranking a proprietary good to be controlled and marketed? Do we allow any media to report on the ratings out of context, or perhaps even redesign their presentation, for instance by cutting the axis and thus seeming to have the WB endorsing erroneous interpretations? What are the market implications of putting the whole credibility of the WB behind a rating? Will the other raters only follow us? Will this only reinforce the cyclical nature of capital flows creating “the Mother of all systemic risks”? If it does not work, can we pull out?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">With respect to the list of the named “experts” not knowing them, I cannot endorse or object. Nonetheless, I sincerely hope that the list does not include any ranking fanatics, but includes more the well-intentioned healthy ranking skeptics who, aware of the needs for rankings, are also conscious of the risks. In other words, I hope the panel does not end up being a panel of “formula builders” but a panel of people who know why, when, and how to use the ranking formulas. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Some follow up comments</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is symptomatic of the many difficulties with rating that the request by the Panel for more analytic work in relation to the weighting system was answered by the Bank with a very basic equal weighting, backed by some correlation analysis. Equal weighting could very well be the best answer, at least in simplicity, but it is also a very normal and transparent way of admitting to not-having-a-clue. In the area of the CPIA ratings, we are indeed walking on very loose sand, and we need to be very careful, come disclosure time.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">When thinking about all the suggested CPIA criteria, I would have many fewer problems with fully disclosing the exact information on each of these fifteen criteria, than with having them all stirred into a murky and totally nontransparent cocktail.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I saw that some Panel members noted that once the disclosures occur, “The Bank should closely monitor any potentially adverse impacts on borrowers, such as misinterpretation of ratings by financial markets, any impact on foreign direct investment, and/or the abuse of ratings for political gains.” This is all well said but, in today’s world of rapid and active communication, those are the things you analyze before you communicate and not after. We wonder whether now is not the appropriate time to leave out the economists, and call in some experts on communication. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Let us never forget that the rankings, unfortunately, say almost as much about the one doing the ranking as they do about the one being ranked.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Just as an example of rankings gone haywire, let me refer to the Globalization Index published some months ago by A. T. Kearney and Foreign Policy. Their ranking method assigns globalization points to countries by measuring the number of internet users, hosts, and secure servers, without even bothering about what contents are transmitted over them and similar media. Who is more global, a family of a rich country with ten televisions for ten local sitcoms, or a family of a poor country with only one TV, but who mostly have to watch foreign programming, and many of whose family members are working abroad? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Let me again illustrate three risks that I believe have not been sufficiently considered.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">· When discussing Argentina we heard comments as to how it changed (almost overnight) from being A Golden Poster Boy into an Ugly Duckling. This begs the question of what could have happened to the reputation of the Bank if our ratings had officially indicated very good results over a long period and then, suddenly, something went wrong. Would creditors sue us? Would credit rating agencies sue us?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">· There is always a risk present when good ratings are thrown in the face of crude realities of poverty, since the hope of food for today is not easily appeased by the promise of food in a year or a decade.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">· The risk that bad ratings could in fact be turned against the interests of furthering development, for instance when bad ratings are brought forward by bad governments as an evidence of their ability to defend their “true” sovereignty. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the very little which our Panel of Experts (mercifully not eminent persons) mentions about disclosure, it urges for the preparation of adequate information to help the public interpret the ratings. This recommendation stands, at least in terms of transparency, in stark contrast with the other recommendation “that the write-ups that accompany the ratings should not be disclosed—as this might discourage candid assessment by staff.” We do not believe that in this respect you should be able to have your cake and eat it too, and so, if you are prepare to disclose a rating, you must be willing to disclose fully how you got it.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>About our own accountability</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Of course I agree with the recommendation that the disclosures of any results should always include a statement indicating that the ratings are the product of “staff judgment.” That said, and given the importance of checks and balances, and accountability, we would like to know a little about the foreseen consequences to staff. This is no minor issue as their judgments, if wrong, and even if right, could foreseeable bring down governments and also stoke anti–World Bank sentiments. I need to bring this up, as the debate reminded me of the note I wrote about the US GAO Report on the IMF.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>What if they rank us?</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Finally, as we see in the documents on the IDA disclosure policy that this exercise generates a normal distribution curve where we can point out the best and the worst performers, I cannot but reflect on the fact that within the Bank, for its own internal evaluation purposes, it seems impossible to gain acceptance for this sort of useful ranking tool. In fact, in most internal evaluations that are presented to the Board, we have not even reached a name disclosure by quintiles and have been basically limited to a binary grading (satisfactory or not), mostly without really even knowing who belongs to any of those groups. Just think about our reactions if some NGO would start to rank the performance of our own country teams and to disclose the results on the www, with three-decimal precision, and arguing that, given the utmost importance of the WB’s poverty-fighting mission, this should be quite helpful</div><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
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</style>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-57311038478428677202006-08-18T10:14:00.001-04:002023-10-09T10:17:09.097-04:00About indexes and their disclosure<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I remember that a few years ago I argued the thesis that lack of information actually could be valuable as a promoter of development. On some occasions, ignorance of certain matters kept alive the dreams of finding the greener valley. These dreams are the ones that drove Americans to invest in Italy, Italians to move to Venezuela and Venezuelans to find work in the United States. This generated economic growth all around.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The increasing speed of today’s information flow raises some doubts. Although it is certainly advantageous to insure that correct and relevant information as well as good news is transmitted rapidly, it is also certain that this same speed is usually applied when propagating incorrect and irrelevant information as well as increasing volumes of bad news. For some not totally identified reason, I feel that the magnifying effect of speed upon bad information is somehow greater that on good information. Making peace, for example, requires much time that is often not available. Provoking war is often a matter of seconds.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Some of the previous concerns plus the fact that we continuously observe how media can make so much of so little have made this whole evolution of jumping from blissful ignorance into urgent pseudo certainties a quite important issue to me.</span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-55207634410921107222006-08-18T09:54:00.010-04:002023-10-09T09:59:21.820-04:00The Riskiness of Country Risk<p><span style="font-size: medium;"> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; text-align: justify;">How horrible it must be to work as an air-traffic controller! Any slight error can provoke an unimaginable human tragedy. No wonder these professionals burn out so rapidly. I “suppose” the same must happen with the country-risk assessors, those people who carefully pass judgment as to what the country risk is for any given nation.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The all important mission of these risk evaluators is twofold. The first, that for which they are actually paid, consists of analyzing whether or not the debtor nation will ultimately be able to honor its obligations. This determines whether or not pension funds, banks, and insurance companies will be willing, or even allowed, to invest in that country’s sovereign debt instruments. The second, even more important than the first, is to send subtle signals to the governments of these nations in order to help them improve their performance.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">What a difficult job this is! If they overdo it and underestimate the risk of a given country, the latter will most assuredly be inundated with fresh loans and will be leveraged to the hilt. The result will be a serious wave of adjustments sometime down the line. If on the contrary, they exaggerate the country’s risk level, it can only result in a reduction in the market value of the national debt, increasing interest expense and making access to international financial markets difficult. The initial mistake will unfortunately turn out to be true, a self-fulfilling prophecy. Any which way, either extreme will cause hunger and human misery.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">What a nightmare it must be to be risk evaluator! Imagine trying to get some shuteye while lying awake in bed thinking that any moment one of those judges, those with the global reach that have a say in anything and everything, determinates that a country has become essentially bankrupt due to your mistake, and then drags you kicking and screaming before an International Court, accused of violating human rights. If I were to be in the position of evaluating country risk, I would insure that the process is totally transparent, even though this takes away some of the shine of the profession and obligates me to sacrifice some of my personal market value.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">How lucky we are that we are neither air-traffic controllers nor sovereign-risk evaluators! However, since we can easily become victims of their missteps, it behooves us, if only because of our survival instinct, to make sure that both do their jobs correctly.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">We have seen in recent <i>Country Reports</i> how, after having introduced a myriad of information into the black box of methodology, as if by magic, a credit qualification is produced. Many of these reports seem to me like the pronouncements of film critics. It would seem that, more often than not, the individual evaluator is determining more how much he likes the ways or forms the <i>Directors</i> of a nation try to honor its obligations than on producing an honest and profound financial analysis of the country’s capacity for servicing its debt correctly.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In his book <i>The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World</i> (New York: Random House, 2001), Lawrence Lessig maintains that an era is identified not so much by what is debated, but by what is actually accepted as true and so is not debated at all. In this sense, given the risk that the <i>perceived country risk</i> actually becomes the real country risk, it is best not to assign an AAA rating <i>blithely</i> to the risk qualifiers—perhaps not even <i>a two-thumbs-up</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2002/09/the-riskiness-of-country-risk.html" target="_blank">From <i>The Daily Journal</i>, Caracas, September 27, 2002</a></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-32823069420110436322006-08-17T20:49:00.002-04:002024-03-14T20:53:23.156-04:00Thou shall not PowerPoint<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· Dear Colleagues,</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· When we were small, our fathers taught us never to FingerPoint anyone, and today we also need to teach kids not to PowerPoint one another. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· Yes, I have seen some splendid use of PowerPoint presentations, but, in general terms, the world is not a better place for it.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· PowerPoint has empowered so many people with so little to say with a deep belief that the world is waiting for them to predicate, for hours. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· PowerPoint is little by little replacing all decent readable issue papers with thick bundles of copies of PowerPoint sheets, each one containing less than 15 words, in beautifully irrelevant colors, except when replaced by thin bundles containing miniature unreadable copies of aforementioned sheets. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· PowerPoint is forcing the world to structure its whole thinking process in terms of bulletpoints. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· NO, thou shall not PowerPoint me and I promise not to PowerPoint you … too </span><span style="font-size: large;">much. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· Happy Holidays</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· Per </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· December, 2003</span></div><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
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</style>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-18191351744876245312006-08-17T18:46:00.001-04:002023-10-07T18:51:25.490-04:00Today, let us talk about the bribers<p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">On the 26th of October, Transparency International, TI, published its annual index ranking the Perception of Corruption that exists in various nations. As usual, Venezuela was somewhere down at the bottom of the list. However, for the first time, TI also published an index related to the Bribe Payers (BPI).</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">This index ranks the 19 countries with the most exports and is based on the perception of how corporations from those countries use bribes to generate business. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">A professional firm interviewed 770 high-level executives in 14 emerging markets with geographically diversified imports. Venezuela was not included among the interviewed parties, since most of its imports come from only one country, the United States.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The executives interviewed belonged to large firms, banks, chambers of commerce, auditing firms, and law firms. A result of 10 points means no bribes are used while 0 means, naturally, that bribing is used as a norm. The countries with the highest ranking were Sweden (8.3), Australia and Canada (8.1) and those at the bottom of the ranking were China (3.1), South Korea (3.4) and Taiwan (3.5). The ranking of some of our main trading partners were England (7.2), Germany and the United States tied at (6.2), Spain (5.3), France (5.2) and Italy (3.7).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Just like the Corruption Index, the Briber’s Index will create much argument and rebuttal, especially from those that were not favored by their ranking within the index. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Among the traditional arguments, we are sure to find that many will maintain that the index is not really objective, but is really all about perception and that therefore, before being an ethical problem it is really more an image problem. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">We will perhaps also hear technologically inspired arguments, such as accusing the better-positioned countries of using advanced versions of corruption, something like the stealth planes that do not appear on the radar. Sometimes when I read about the lobbying in the United States, I can’t avoid a nagging feeling that corruption has just been institutionalized.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">I have often seen how citizens of many developed countries shed their shackles and truly enjoy as tourists the perhaps humanizing experience of trying to avoid a traffic ticket by negotiating avidly with the particular foreign public servant who has accosted them. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">On the other hand I have also seen people who behave better away than at home. We see it over and over again when Venezuelans, who, although notorious tax evaders at home, become exemplary citizens when overseas—to the extreme of not using readily available and popular loopholes. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Because of those contradictions it could be interesting to compare the two indexes side by side, and find out whether there are some significant inconsistencies. It does not look that way as with the exception of 5 countries, all those that have been ranked in both indexes, are basically in the same relative position. As it were, Sweden is first in both indexes while China is last.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The two main exceptions to this rule are Singapore which, in this group of 19, appears as 3rd in terms of the least corrupt nations but as number 11 in the Bribers Index and Belgium which, contrary to Singapore, ranks as number 15 of the least corrupt nations, but comes out somewhat better as number 8 among the Briber’s. Let us speculate a bit about the meaning of these results.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">On Singapore the results would indicate that it behaves very well at home, but goes haywire and is a menace when abroad. Without a doubt, a country like this must be a formidable competitor in foreign trade and one would entreat the OECD to insure that it is also enrolled among those countries that have recently signed the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">But what about those Belgians? Surprisingly they seem to behave better abroad than at home. Could this be some kind of special “stealth” technology at work? Could it be that they on purpose wish to be perceived as corrupt at home, in order to enhance belief in their human nature? Or could it be that they simply have decided to invest in a change of their image abroad, and that this was ultimately successful?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">We shall see what gives next year when new investigative technologies tackle the inexplicable.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2023/10/today-let-us-talk-about-bribers.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: large;">From <i>The Daily Journal</i>, Caracas, November 4 1999</span></a><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-17205915661205178102006-08-17T18:41:00.004-04:002023-10-07T18:46:05.743-04:00The index of perceived Corruption<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Transparency International (TI) has developed an index by means of which it ranks countries around the world according to their perceived levels of internal corruption. I have a Danish friend who recently came to me for the umpteenth time with this list clutched firmly in his fist, proudly crowing over the fact that Denmark once again tops the list as the least corrupt country while Venezuela once again comes in toward the bottom, beaten out for the basement spot by only seven countries among which we find Colombia and Nigeria.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">As a Venezuelan, I immediately went into a defensive mode. I argued that since the index is based on the perception of corruption, it could be that the results merely indicate a serious problem of exactly that, the perception, not the reality. Additionally, should this actually be true (evidently not the case), I told him that although I did lament the fact that Venezuela was not mentioned in the top half of the list, I was at least satisfied that we were definitely not occupying any “not too human” first place.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">My good friend, observing my discomfort, realizing that I have some Swedish blood in my veins, and in a sincere effort to console me, blurted out that in reality he also did not understand why Denmark had been ranked first while Sweden was ranked third. My immediate reply was “Chico, Denmark must simply have paid more for it.” </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Jest aside, the index is the result of a serious effort on the part of professionals of diverse backgrounds who, using the few tools available, have managed to develop a system of evaluation which is useful and of great support for every citizen wishing to combat this age-old plague. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Its importance is of even greater significance when we hear that Transparency International suggests that we don’t attribute more accuracy than necessary to its index. Venezuela’s ranking on this list of 85 countries is such that it is evident, to say the least, that the country’s level of corruption is far greater than average. This is bad enough!</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Any debate over whether Venezuela should be ranked higher could be perceived simply as a strategy aimed at discrediting the index. Only the beneficiaries of corruption could possibly have an interest in doing this. A true patriot would not waste one single second of his or her valuable time in debating why people speak poorly of our country. On the contrary, he would dedicate all his time and energy to correct the reality instead of objecting to the perception.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">This debate on corruption is truly difficult and complicated. Even though we should be pleased that such an index exists, I am worried that the mere fact that we are trying to reduce corruption to terms of a measurable dimension may lead us to oversimplify the problem dangerously.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The index, in principle, only measures the perception of corruption in general terms. This is defined in ample terms as “the abuse of public office for private gain.” In this sense, and because of the nature of the problem, I am sure that when using the term “gain” we are referring mostly to a monetary benefit. This avoids measuring other aspects of corruption that could be just as important or more.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">For instance, I believe that the appointment of someone to public office for reasons other than his or her capacity or professional integrity is a corruption that is even more pernicious and costly to the country than the sum of all monetary corruption put together.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">An example of this is our recent banking-sector crisis. The costs caused by the poor administration of this crisis are far and above the costs attributable directly to the bankers involved. It’s not that the bankers are free of guilt. They did undoubtedly start the fire. But whose fault is it that the financial firemen were caught napping and did not hear the alarms, and that once they finally got to the scene of the disaster they tried to douse the flames with gasoline instead of water?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">I make these comments to remind all that the monster of corruption has a thousand heads. I would be sad if all the result of the efforts to slay this monster would simply be the elimination of the traditional offers of discounts for prompt payment, right then and there, and that we frequently receive when fined for a traffic violation.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Let me make one last comment on this quite tortuous subject. In Venezuela, perhaps more than in any other countries, there is more than sufficient evidence of the total administrative ineptitude of the state, and all of our governments have absolutely no results to show, considering all of their income. Nonetheless multilateral agencies, such as the International Monetary Fund, frequently come to the country and recommend an action that could only mean allowing the state to squander even more resources. For whom then is the IMF working? For the politicians? Could we then be staring at another unknown dimension of this monster called Corruption?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/1998/11/the-index-of-perceived-corruption.html" target="_blank">From The Daily Journal, Caracas, November 4 1998</a></span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-7589817298728272702006-08-17T17:40:00.001-04:002023-11-02T17:48:33.179-04:00 AIDS vs. Malaria<div style="text-align: justify;">There we sat listening astonished to the Minister of Health describing that what she most needed was help in fighting the malaria that was killing more people in her country than the AIDS, but AIDS was what donors mostly prioritized. How sad! The high mortality rate of the malaria came as a surprise to me but from what I deducted the malaria strain in most of Africa is much worse that what we are accustomed to in South America. We were informed that the anti malaria drugs we have been supplied by the bank for the trip were not allowed in this country as they could create an even more drug resistant strain. Answering some nervous questions the Minister informed us EDs that the malaria mosquito attacked exclusively at night and only if the victim was still and that’s why the protective nets are so important. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Malaria is a tragedy, and so you have to forgive me but I cannot refrain from telling you that after the minister’s mosquito comments, I detected immediate incipient salsa-like movements in my colleague’s limbs (mine as well) and that grew stronger as night approached. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Giving away Bouncing Balls</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">During a previous trip I had learned from a grand lady colleague from the richest country to bring some bouncing balls to give away. I threw them at the dozen young kids standing there and only two of them moved. The rest did not even acknowledge it in their poverty and misery-filled glazed eyes. Per, what are you doing here? This is so far away from your realities that there is no way you could really add something useful. Yes. I know! But then again that is perhaps exactly what I needed to see … with my own tear-glazed eyes.</div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-47082209530957300252006-08-17T12:29:00.034-04:002023-11-08T16:07:40.642-05:00A too long C.V. or a too short memoir, and acknowledgements<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">My mother Ingrid is from Sweden and my father Tady was from Poland, and I was born in 1950, in San Cristóbal, Venezuela, close to the Colombian border. By the way, if you would end up thinking I am having an adventurous life let me assure you it’s nothing when compared to that of my parents.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Sweden: After Venezuela, Sweden is undoubtedly the country that has had the most influence on my life, and I will always harbor an immense gratitude to it. It is a truly amazing country, and I pray its future generations really get to understand and appreciate what it has been able to achieve and why they need and should defend their way of doing it over and over again. I am certain that our best chances for the ongoing globalization of the world to end in something good lies completely in the hands of being able to use Sweden (and their neighbors) as shining examples of roads worthy to follow.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Poland: Even though I do not know it (yet), and I do not speak a word of Polish, I have always felt very much identified with my father’s homeland. My third name is Stanislaw, and through it I feel connected to the rebellious spirit and freedom urge of my ancestors. It was indeed one of my proudest moments when I and my daughters received our Polish passports.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The United States of America and I: In a world where everything is radicalizing and so many believe that if you are not 100% for, you have to be 100% against, I need to make a very personal comment about the United States, because I refer to it frequently in this book, given its importance in the world.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">My father, as a Polish soldier taken prisoner of war by the Germans, spent five years in concentration camps, from the last of which he was liberated by American soldiers. I was brought up on a pro-American diet and for many years counted To Hell and Back, the 1955 movie that recounted the life of Audie Murphy, America’s most-decorated soldier in the Second World War, among my favorites. There is no way on earth that I could suffer from any sort of real anti–United States of America phobia. If I criticize, make recommendations, or observe some things that I believe could be improved in the United States, I always do so as a sincere friend who truly wishes for that much-admired country to live up to those very high standards of which I feel it is capable. And when it doesn’t, I am just a much-saddened friend, but never a foe. The United States should not ignore the fact that out there it has many true friends who truly wish it well. It should never confuse them with all those who are plain bootlickers.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Also, if the ongoing globalization is to stand a chance to end in something good for the world, this will also very much depend on the willingness of the USA to do the right things right. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">But please, do not let the previous comments confuse you … I am foremost and above all a Venezuelan.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Young</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">My studies started in Venezuela, in a kinder at a catholic nun school, with a 3-boys-to-100 girl ratio, unfortunately at a time when I had yet to grasp the significance of this numerical advantage. My primary school happened in a very small—really tiny—Evangelical school in San Cristóbal. Television had not yet arrived to the region and neither had telephones to Palmira, where we lived. My contacts with the outer world occurred, therefore, through radio and books … but so intensively that CNN never really surprised me.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Youth</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">From there, at the age of 12, I took off to Sweden to a boarding school in Sigtuna. The school was quite renowned (in Sweden) as their future king of Sweden was studying there. Also, in the closet of my room, Olof Palme, the illustrious and later assassinated Prime Minister of Sweden, had also scribbled his name.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">My Andean Pact Trip</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In 1966 at age 16 and a week, I took a summer job on a Swedish merchant boat for four months mostly scrubbing dishes and rust. This trip took me from Europe to South America where I visited ports in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Chile. Bolivia did not have a port but luckily for me, as the vessel’s name was MS Bolivia, I was able to later argue that it was a full Andean Pact trip. I need not say that this type of summer jobs was not that frequent in my boarding school.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Academics</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Between 1969 and 1971, very fast, two years plus many- many summer courses, urging to get back to Venezuela before the tranquility of Sweden got a final grip on me, I graduated as an economist in the University of Lund. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Back to Caracas, between 1972 and 1974, fulltime immersion at the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administración, IESA, and where I earned my MBA, with distinction. Thereafter I started my professional life, with two initial brief and surrealistic experiences:</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Diversifying into the blue</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The first, in a local important commercial bank had me going, after just one week, to Panama, to participate in a workshop arranged by their associate, a big international big bank, to discuss the latter’s worldwide diversification strategy … Fortunately, it took us less than an hour to agree that no one of us had the slightest idea of what we were supposed to be doing, so we gave up on the intent, and had a good time over the weekend. (I still remember with much fondness a great show, in a very dingy place, by Daniel Santos, one of the long gone icons of boleros, that beautiful lamenting bluesy tropical musical that had everyone cutting their veins … normally because of non-answered love). </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Some weeks of public … disservice?</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Back in the bank, after just another two weeks, and I guess because of my Panama experience, my name was put forward as a candidate for the post of Diversification Manager in the Venezuela Investment Fund that was being created to handle the oil income surpluses of the nation. I entered the Fund its very first day, and I left a couple of weeks later the same day my desk arrived, utterly frustrated when the Fund was requested to analyze, and obviously endorse, the economic feasibility studies of a 4-billion-dollar investment known as the Fourth Plan of SIDOR, the big Venezuelan iron and steel complex. With an “if something goes wrong with this project the Venezuelans might have the right to hang us in Plaza Bolívar, and I’m much too young for that” I slammed the door on the public sector … for the following 28 years.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Riding harvest combines</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Urgently back to the real world … although I must say a bit too real for my taste. During the following year I traveled around Venezuela harvesting rice and sorghum, with a fleet of ten beautiful big light-blue combines, all perfectly inadequate for Venezuelan conditions. I got trapped into this when one of the partners in what seemed a viable agribusiness proposal, the agronomical engineer of the group, on the spur of a moment, decided to buy 10 totally untested combines, arguing that by doing so we had won the right for an exclusive representation of that brand in Venezuela. As we were never able to reduce the droppings of the combine to less than 20%, I guess it was pure beginner’s luck that we did not combine our problems by using these rights and selling these combines to others. Being that the concept of an MBA was quite new in Venezuela and no one really knew what they were for, least I, the group deemed me to be the right universal tool to get it out of its serious predicament … and so they sent me out as their line manager, all over Venezuela. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Back to harbor … or new frontiers</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">A year later, tired of being pursued by angry farmers, I cut my losses, not by far short enough, and with a substantial negative balance (zero assets and a lot of debt) I went to do what an MBA is suppose to do, manage, for big bucks, other peoples companies. In a few years I managed to turn into an eminent financial leasing company expert and even the manager of one. In this I was greatly assisted by the fact that few in Venezuela really knew what leasing was all about … which gave me a lot of leeway</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Personal blessings</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I did well. Not only did I manage to repay my debts but also, most importantly, I married Mercedes. Besides being a wonderful wife and mother, Mercedes is an excellent lawyer with 20 years of corporate experience in Venezuela, recently overhauled with an LLM from Georgetown University. Besides, she also moonlights, for free, as my Spanish editor. To round up this personal paragraph let me say that Mercedes and I have been blessed with three beautiful and most talented daughters, Mercedes, Alexandra and Adriana, and who also, when push comes to shove, stand in as great friends. As the only man in the house, I have been staged in the role of the gentle and good World Bank, while Mercedes, poor her, has to play … and be … the strict IMF.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Learning how not to bike</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I made some splash with my statement of learning how to bike during the debates about using Country Systems. Therefore I believe I should confess here (in an appendix) that my youngest daughter, Adriana, set out to bike with her roller skates on—and crashed. We had to look in the dark for her two front teeth and, instructed through cell phone by my favorite dentist, my brother Sven, I reinserted them. I got it wrong the first time, so I had to take them out and do it again. But, don’t worry, Adriana’s fine. Her confidence did not take a beating; she stills bikes, but does not rollerblade, at least not simultaneously. As for me, I had the type of experience you just don’t really need as a father. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">An intermezzo</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">From mid 1979 until mid 1980, before the girls were born my wife and I also took a year out in London. There I practiced at Kleinwort and Benson, one of the truly old English Merchant Banks that has since then, as so many others, gone down, disappeared or been diluted, in the oceans of globalization. During this year I also had the chance to attend London School of Economics, as a listener to International Commerce and take the Corporate Finance Evening Course at London Business School. I made some money investing in currency futures … but I got out of it … as I did not see a real win-win opportunity in it … more the contrary.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Financial brewer</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Back in Venezuela, by mid 1980, I signed up as Finance Director for a brewery that was facing serious troubles as their market share was dropping from 30% to 8%, over few months, so fast that it finally could not service, even the first quarterly installment of a huge international bank syndicated loan. The scandal, not of my doing, resulted in the first real Chapter 11 type of proceedings ever initiated in Venezuela for a public listed company, and helped me (and some others) build a small reputation in work-outs.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>At last my niche</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In 1983, I had had enough doing just one thing all the time, and so I entered into private consultancy, that allowed me to suggest other people what to do … all of their time. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">From then until 2002, I enjoyed 19 years of great and varied experience. In areas of hotels, resorts, industries, hospitals, aluminum, oranges, chemicals, real estate, paper, printing … and so on. Mostly for local clients, but also for some multinationals, some which even led me to negotiate a deal with IFC during the early nineties. I worked mostly in traditional corporate financial and strategic planning and marketing, but I also got seriously into some exotic products such as debt equity conversions. I worked mostly in Venezuela, but also managed to get some interesting assignments in Colombia. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Mangoes</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">With the aid of friends, I dappled in some ventures and one of them was exporting mangoes. We actually managed to get into Harrods’ delicacy department with our beautiful multicolored and individually wrapped mangoes and we were doing great … until. Our largest individual cost was the airfreight to London, that we had to pay in advance and so when a finance minister woke up in Venezuela and announced, that according to him, the Bolivar was undervalued and then he executivized it from 36 to 24 to the dollar (something perfectly feasible in the short term in an oil country) the day before we were to convert into Bolivars all our British Pounds, he bombed our cash flow. Having to fight against the mosquito in the mangoes or the flight schedules of British Airways was one thing, having also to fight against the ego of a finance minister, was just too much.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Teaching</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">For a very brief moment, 1974-75 I taught corporate finance at Universidad Metropolitana in Caracas. Also at IESA, I shared for a couple of years the responsibility of lecturing in International Finance. Teaching has always attracted me but somehow no one ever baited me irresistibly enough. Even nowadays, I still toy with the idea of going back to get my PHD, not because I am truly convinced about it, but because it seems to have turned into an obligatory requirement for allowing you to either teach or research. (Might there be a market opportunity for a University principled on No Ph.D.s allowed?)</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Bank representative</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">For about 10 years I acted as the representative in Venezuela for the O’Higgins Bank of Chile, later Banco the Santiago … until the Banco Santander of Spain purchased the Chilean bank and globalized me out of a nice and cozy relation. During those years I had the chance of frequently going to Chile and study their real and their not so real progress. While doing so, I had to hear so much hoopla about their social security system that I guess I developed some antibodies that might currently affect how I look on this whole issue. Nonetheless, I do admire many of their other efforts and I wish them all of the best as they are really great people. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Almost banking</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">As the Chile representation was almost a sideline, and as the name correctly indicates, mainly a representation, I never actually worked in real banking. That said, I had a lot to do with many banks, developing for some great strategic plans that were never executed, and holding the hand of others in difficult times such as interventions. These close but afar relationships with the banks and their clients, is what inspired me later to set out on my Get-Basel-Bank Regulations-Under-Control mini crusade.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Honduras & Guatemala</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">A friend, Christopher Jennings whom I had met when the company he worked for was trying to get the mandate to operate the Caracas water system and I initially handled this quest, made it to the Inter-American Development Bank. From there he called out for assistance in setting up the financial mechanism of some water projects plus some other tidbits and I will always be very grateful for these opportunities, as they became the looking glasses with which a private sector man like me could peek into the public ... and opine. Many of my Central American experiences were made much more enjoyable through the great support I always received from Ian Walker and all his associates in ESA Consultores.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Writing</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In July 1997 I suddenly got the chance to write some articles … and have them published. This turned out to be a blessing. Not only was the writing an escape valve that released the pressure I felt as an unsatisfied citizen in a country with very unsatisfactory showings, but also a very energizing tool as it forced me to get close to what was going on in the world as large. Soon I will have written four hundred articles and I might have a loyal following that, unfortunately, does not always guarantee the inclusion of my three daughters … Daddy what have you been writing about lately?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Music</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I cannot come close to describing my life without including some lines about music. I play the guitar and harmonica … as a totally self-taught amateur … who is at his best when there is no real musician close by as a reference … and I love it. In fact there was a time when my sound engineer (Mercedes, my wife) and I escaped to the Island of Margarita over weekends so that I could play incognito for foreign tourists at a small hotel where I as a small shareholder could exercise some influence. Once after my concert (concert … no understatement there), I was tipped by a German tourist, and I still remember that as a very proud moment … by the way, my sound engineer was also once approached in terms of what she would be doing after she got off her duties. During three consecutive years, I participated in a choir at my alma mater IESA, twice a week, from 6 to 8 p.m. … what a lovely way to catch up with life. At the World Bank, to help show that we EDs could also be “somewhat” human, I could not resist Tara Sharafudeen’s very insistent invitation to participate in the Celebration of Cultures show with my guitar and my harmonica. Because of logistical considerations, it had to be during an Asian show where I, among a lot of participants from India, sang about Venezuela … I defended the whole mix up by advancing the thesis that India was quite naturally doing a little bit of musical outsourcing to South America.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>And that was when …</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In August 2002, the Planning Minister of Venezuela, Dr. Felipe Perez, a man who, I feel, deeply believes in transparency, local participation … and open systems (Linux), communicated, on the Web, about Venezuela’s turn to nominate an ED in the World Bank, asking for candidates. With probably unwarranted but still unchecked optimism, I went for it.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>CV Acknowledgements</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">There is no way I could write this type of CV memoir without also including my thanks to the rest of my family and some very special friends. First of all Fredrik, my younger brother, who by relieving me of many of the older-brother-duties, helps me to travel lighter in life and also Sven and Karin, my still younger siblings, without whom family would not remotely be family. From my Sweden of so many years ago, I still feel next to me Klas Gierow, Otto Ramel, Lars Henriksson, and Anders Hedborg. Of course there are others from the opposite sex, whom I have not forgotten, but here I am perhaps better off by cryptically referring to a Willie Nelson and Julio Iglesias song. From my professional years in Venezuela there’s no way I can get by without mentioning Jose Manuel Egui and Antonio Iszak. And through my years as consultant, what would I have done without my partners in crime, Daniel Boersner and Rafael Lorenzo. Let me also give some special thanks to all of Mercedes’ family. Her father, Jose Antonio Cordido-Freytes, a young judge in Venezuela, officially married my parents soon sixty years ago … talk about conspiracy theories … and her mother, Eva Mercedes stands out as a model for the mother in law you all would have killed for. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Finally I must acknowledge the great help received in putting together this book from my editor in chief, James T. McDonough, Jr., and his personal editor, his wife Zaida. As he wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on The Structural Metrics of the Iliad and among his many editorial credits lists a World Dictionary of Foreign Expressions and a couple of medical dictionaries, I found him perfectly suited to guide me through a globalization book without taking any of my uttering for granted. I let many of his comments be a part of the book without even talking about copyright issues with him. I guess that if we run into some problems, we can both count on Zaida and Mercedes to bail us out.</span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-5482316507961120462006-08-17T11:43:00.001-04:002024-01-28T11:50:53.742-05:00Puritanism in banking<div style="text-align: center;"><b>Puritanism in banking</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In his book Money: Whence it came, where it went” (1975), John Kenneth Galbraith discusses banks and banking issues which I believe may be applicable to the Venezuela of today.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In one section, he addresses the function of banks in the creation of wealth. Galbraith speculates on the fact that one of the basic fundamentals of the accelerated growth experienced in the western and south-western parts of the United States during the past century was the existence of an aggressive banking sector working in a relatively unregulated environment. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Banks opened and closed doors and bankruptcies were frequent, but as a consequence of agile and flexible credit policies, even the banks that failed left a wake of development in their passing. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In a second section, Galbraith refers to the banks’ function of democratization of capital as they allow entities with initiative, ideas, and will to work although they initially lack the resources to participate in the region’s economic activity. In this second case, Galbraith states that as the regulations affecting the activities of the banking sector are increased, the possibilities of this democratization of capital would decrease. There is obviously a risk in lending to the poor.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In Venezuela, the last few years [the 1990s] have seen a debate, almost puritan in its fervor, relative to banking activity and how, through the implementation of increased controls, we could avoid a repeat of a banking crisis like the one suffered in 1994 at a cost of almost 20% of GDP. Up to a certain point, this seems natural in light of the trauma created by this crisis. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">However, in a country in which unemployment increases daily and critical poverty spreads like powder, I believe we have definitely lost the perspective of the true function of a bank when I read about the preoccupation of our Bank Regulating Agency that “the increase in credit activity could be accompanied by the risk that loans awarded to new clients are not backed up with necessary support (guarantees)” and that as a result we must consider new restrictions on the sector.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is obvious that we must ensure that banks do not overstep their bounds while exercising their primary functions—a mistake which in turn would result in costly rescue operations. We cannot, however, in lieu of perfecting this control, lose sight of the fact that the banks’ principal purpose should be to assist in the country’s economic development and that it is precisely with this purpose in mind that they are allowed to operate. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I cannot believe that any of the Venezuelan banks were awarded their charters based purely and simply on a blanket promise to return deposits. Additionally, when we talk about not returning deposits, nobody can deny that—should we add up the costs caused by the poor administration, sins, and crimes perpetrated by the local private banking sector throughout its history—this would turn out to be only a fraction of the monetary value of the comparable costs caused by the public/government sector.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Regulatory Puritanism can affect the banking sector in many ways. Among others, we can mention the fact that it could obligate the banks to accelerate unduly the foreclosure and liquidation of a business client simply because the liquid value for the bank in the process of foreclosure is much higher than the value at which the bank is forced to carry the asset on its books. In the Venezuela of today, we do not have the social flexibility to be able to afford unnecessary foreclosures and liquidations.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In order to comprehend the process involved in the accounting of losses in a bank, one must understand that this does not necessarily have anything to do with actual and real losses, but rather with norms and regulations that require the creation of reserves. Obviously banks will be affected more or less depending on the severity of these norms. Currently, a comparative analysis would show that Venezuela has one of the most rigid and conservative sets of regulations in the world. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On top of this, we have arrived at this extreme situation from a base, extreme on the other end of the spectrum, in which not only was the regulatory framework unduly flexible, but in which, due to the absence of adequate supervision, the regulations were practically irrelevant.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Obviously, the process of going from one extreme to the other in the establishment of banking regulations is one of the explanations for the severe contraction of our banking sector. Until only a few years ago, Venezuela’s top banks were among the largest banks of Latin America. Today, they simply do not appear on the list.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is evident that the financial health of the Venezuelan banking community requires an economic recovery and any Bank Superintendent complying with his mission should actively be supporting said recovery instead of, as sometimes seems evident, trying to receive distinctions for merit from Basel (home of the international bank regulatory agencies). </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If we insist in maintaining a firm defeatist attitude which definitely does not represent a vision of growth for the future, we will most likely end up with the most reserved and solid banking sector in the world, adequately dressed in very conservative business suits, presiding over the funeral of the economy. I would much prefer their putting on some blue jeans and trying to get the economy moving. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">From The Daily Journal, Caracas, June 1997</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOnwSKwjhXK-NjWSetsCa5R3RL2JNyZ6xjulo55PNsRPUOKtcH9HOLTnKhufl7iSvqcxH5gDMFi1rulpePnIZ_OWQmH5R5k1eWcBlcgjQVLCqfMRV1zI_OtEA8EjwjBvZeLNa4DS4ORcGdybgRNL-az1HrtGhd_UOJGF2bHKTogEdJFzK9z-Aj/s3654/DJ12061997.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3654" data-original-width="2559" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOnwSKwjhXK-NjWSetsCa5R3RL2JNyZ6xjulo55PNsRPUOKtcH9HOLTnKhufl7iSvqcxH5gDMFi1rulpePnIZ_OWQmH5R5k1eWcBlcgjQVLCqfMRV1zI_OtEA8EjwjBvZeLNa4DS4ORcGdybgRNL-az1HrtGhd_UOJGF2bHKTogEdJFzK9z-Aj/s320/DJ12061997.jpg" width="224" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-17839016299163444832006-08-17T10:55:00.001-04:002023-10-07T10:58:01.233-04:00Guaranteed boring<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In a world with so much entertainment available anytime and anywhere there might be a niche for a tourism that guarantees a boring experience. “<b><i>Get a good reference point. After a week with us, we guarantee you’ll enjoy much more the rest of your travels and even perhaps the rest of your life.</i></b>”</span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-37940449405944374112006-08-17T10:46:00.016-04:002023-10-07T16:29:39.470-04:00Vanity tourism<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I received an e-mail saying: “Take this one! Attached is one article published by ABCNews.com which states that without a doubt, Venezuelans are by a long shot the vainest people in the world.” The index reveals that 65% of Venezuelan women and 47% of Venezuelan men say that they “think about what they look like all the time.” In Germany, for contrast, virtually no one confesses to this habit.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">From the tone of the e-mail, I suppose that the sender considered the high ranking achieved by Venezuela in this index as being unfavorable, and I also suppose that he would like me to share some degree of guilt. Well, I DON’T! Intuitively, I am pleased to be part of a country in which my compatriots are worried about their appearance instead of rubbing shoulders with those ranked among those who “never think about how they look.” The fact that our society holds dear to the heart a feeling of vanity over and above levels in other countries certainly differentiates us from the rest and perhaps we should analyze this fact within the context of comparative advantages. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The dedication of persons like Osmel Sousa to the Miss Venezuela beauty contest has elevated our country to the apex of world perception of the beauty of Venezuelan women. By using the word “perception,” I do not intend to question the objective beauty of our women (God forbid, I have four of them at home!). I wish to make a point of the importance of the general perception per se. This, by the way, renders even the less pretty Venezuelans beautiful.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Any country culturally geared toward taking care of physical appearance for centuries, that has managed to develop methods and formulas that have been time-tested and proven to the world by live TV transmissions of Miss World, Miss Universe, and similar mega events, has in its hands a tool to attract tourism that other countries would give one arm and half the other to have.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">And so I promptly pushed the “reply” icon on my computer and sent off the following message:</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">“Thanks for having sent me the Vanity Index. I think there must be certain mistakes in the Index since I believe that the figures for Venezuela are too low. In Venezuela, I would say that 100% of the population worries about how they look.” </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">“While we talk about appearances, you should see the results we have achieved with a treatment supervised by the stylist school of Caracas which includes massages in the turbulent waters of the Caroní river and scrubbing with powerful and mystic Orinoco algae, while listening to the sensual rhythm of the beating of the herons’ wings and drinking a skin reconstituent malt-based beverage. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">And all this under the indiscrete tropical moon, for only US $1,680 per day!</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Extracted from “<a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/1999/10/vanity-and-nations-economy.html" target="_blank">Vanity and the nation’s economy</a>” published in The Daily Journal, Caracas, October 1999</span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-33093433520043307502006-08-17T10:33:00.002-04:002023-10-07T10:45:31.583-04:00Adventure (fiscal) tourism<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Nag, nag, nag about not being able to develop our tourism as we should … but perhaps there’s still hope. On this marvelous island (Margarita - Venezuela) where the ingenuity and genes of its native and assimilated population are put to work full-time to confront all adversities with spunk and élan, new promotional strategies for increasing tourism are being designed.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">As a sales tax was recently introduced in this previously unspoiled paradise, the merchants, instead of despairing, have instead taken it as an opportunity to offer all those tourists, who are so burdened with taxes in their homelands, the possibility of participating in the exhilarating experience of evading taxes. Just a variant of adventure tourism! To that effect some Tax-Evasion-Certificates are currently being designed, and there is great optimism that these will be able to compete successfully with any of the dried and lacquered fish sold in other souvenir shops around the Caribbean. The local authorities, not wanting to be left behind, are also studying the possibility of raffling one citation by their taxmen among every five thousand tourists. Clearly it should be the highlight of a trip for a Hans from Hamburg to be able to frame and hang a citation in his living room from which he escaped by taking the plane one hour before he was to appear in tax court. It sure must beat a couple of hours of those boring videos that friends abhor.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The same goes for corruption and, just to prove they have nothing against videos per-se, a local production company is setting up arrangements so that tourists can fall into the local nets of the slightly overweight transit police who have bugged everyone on the island for generations, and thereafter work themselves out of the mess, on camera. Clearly a video of one bribing the authorities must beat any African antelope head on the walls, no matter how wide its horns.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://perkurowski.blogspot.com/1999/05/not-much-added-value-to-value-added-tax.html"><span style="font-size: medium;">Extract from an article The Daily Journal, Caracas, May 14 1999</span></a></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-25515064426501996802006-08-17T10:26:00.001-04:002023-10-07T10:31:53.705-04:00Dead and Useful<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-size: medium;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Note: The following is a quite daring piece I wrote on a plane during an ED trip after having being challenged to it by a colleague who is a true Robert Louis Stevenson fanatic. (In the end the article might have been too much even for the Rolling Stone magazine)</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Dead and Useful</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A friend, upon hearing that I was going to Samoa, reminded me that I could not miss the opportunity of visiting Robert Louis Stevenson’s grave. “Of course I won’t,” I said, but it got me thinking.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Would my friend have suggested seeing RLS’ grave, were he buried in London? Of course not! The fact that he is buried on an island without an excessive abundance of so-called big tourist sights presents a win-win situation in terms of development strategies. For instance, if Mick and Keith, on account of their Voodoo LP, were to be buried in Haiti, they still might provide a much-needed and useful boost to the island. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But that’s not all. We all know that “location, location, location” is the mantra for any real-estate affair, and this burial site alternative has the potential to create its own location value, since many Mick and Keith fans could find merit in having their own graves located next to them. As most of the gravesites for these graveyards could be negotiated on a pre-burial basis, and as the state of the clientele permits overcrowding the venues with little added risk, the business opportunities are immense. This goes not only for the initial ticket offering (nothing to do with offerings) but also for the secondary market where scalpers (nothing to do with scalping) should be able to enjoy a strong and renewable support level, provided mainly by visiting family members.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The constraints are few, and the potential huge. You need not locate Mick and Keith in the same spot—you could rotate them from graveyard to graveyard, giving a fresh meaning to a Farewell Tour. Flexibility in product design could also allow marketing the graveyard as timeshare units, providing the possibility for an exchange of a week or two, perhaps even with Eleanor Rigby’s Resort-yard. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But, of course, it’s not only about rock and roll. Just think of all the very powerful and attractive burial arrangements you could achieve by mixing yesterday’s and tomorrow’s lovers, friends, or foes. Personally I find the foe niche especially interesting, since it would give a much more profound and proactive significance to the whole concept of a peaceful rest. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">P.S. I finally went to visit RLS’ grave in Samoa and although I never made it up to the mountaintop, I must confess that it was much more than a grave. His former residence houses a splendid museum where, guided by a classy and knowledgeable local girl, we were shown interesting glimpses of the five final years of this famous Scottish author. I submit that this little detail does not invalidate the general dead-and-useful proposal.</div></span>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-69991507701070893462006-08-17T10:14:00.015-04:002023-10-07T10:25:21.177-04:00A niche in crookedness?<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">(A letter not published by Financial Times)</span></div><span style="font-size: medium;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Sir, in your series about reforming Europe you refer to Pisa’s medieval tower as a “spectacular example of a grand architectural project gone awry: beautiful, still in existence, but wrong nonetheless,” and you got it all wrong. It is just because the tower is leaning that it has turned into one of the most outstanding commercial successes. What would a straight tower have meant to Pisa? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I wish to make this point since when trying to pursue an “antidote to decline” in today’s difficult environment, trying to straighten out Italy in too many aspects might actually break it. There might very well be interesting little niches in crookedness to pursue, and, besides, without some of it, the world would be an unbearably boring place.</div></span><br />Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-58149284989714019152006-08-17T10:07:00.001-04:002023-10-07T10:12:18.420-04:00Lessons from Florence<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Dear Franco and Biaggio (my two Italian colleagues at the World Bank), I went to Florence—and I got inspired.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>THE CONTEST!</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">My apologies to the Florentines, but their beautiful city is like the Magic Kingdom of the Renaissance. The inexhaustible flow of tourists, hotels, prices, and lines for attractions, fast or slow meals, and souvenirs, all makes one question, between Medici and Disney, just who copied the model of whom. In my opinion, not only are the gelatos of Florence richer, but also, with the possible exception of Goofy, Michelangelo’s David and the frescos of Fra Angélico are far superior to Mickey, Pluto, and the rest. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">What an inheritance the Medicis left to their city! The Florentine economy will always be easy to manage, since the only thing that their Paperon de Paperoni (Scrooge McDuck) has to do is fix admissions prices. The one little cloud on the horizon could be the quantity of English, Venezuelan, German, and other immigrants who try to take advantage of the infrastructure. What would Machiavelli have thought about entering the European Union?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">We know that despite all its possibilities, Venezuela, in a local saying, still has not managed to connect the foot to the ball when it comes to developing its tourism industry. This will never be resolved by naming ministers who spend their time conducting publicity campaigns, or visiting Orlando and Florence. We are not proposing that other Medicis substitute for those who govern us—we can discuss this on another day. But in the meantime, we could emulate the experts.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In Florence 500 years ago, the contest system was used to assure that the best artistic proposals were utilized to adorn the city. So let’s organize a grand contest.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">It will be a grand contest to choose a grand team and a grand plan for the strategic development and management of the tourism sector for the next 30 years, with an estimate of costs and results.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">A qualified panel of judges should choose the best three proposals, and the proposals should be publicly debated on television. The losers will receive an important prize, and the winners will be commissioned to execute their proposal during thirty years, with a significant fixed, indexed and guaranteed annual budget.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Since televised public contests enjoy high ratings, this contest could also be a way to build pontes novos, new bridges, in our divided society.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The Santa María del Fiore Cathedral took more than 100 years to construct, and for a long time everyone thought its dome would be impossible to build. And so, friends, let’s not lose the hope of finding a local genius like Brunelleschi for our Helicoide (a local 45-year-old monstrous white elephant). </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="http://alborotandoturismo.blogspot.com/2003/04/aprendamos-de-florencia.html" target="_blank">From El Universal, Caracas, April 10, 2003</a></span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-36616425955891295602006-08-16T11:51:00.002-04:002022-03-24T12:05:27.001-04:00Let them bike<div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Intro</b>: The debate about using Country Systems. Why did I spend so much time on this issue?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Whether to let the countries learn and develop on their own in their own way and assisting them by freely giving some of the very scarce resources or whether to impose some conditions on how they are to manage these resources is one of the most difficult balancing acts of any development policy.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There must be thousands of examples of how development funds have been squandered to no avail by bad governments and crooked politicians, and certainly there are thousand of examples of how good-intentioned agencies have, in a quite similar and yet opposite way, squandered these scarce funds by imposing absolutely misplaced rules and conditions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As I never believed that you could create good artists by having students practice painting by numbers, this little spot number 17 blue, and as those wanting to impose more and ever stricter conditions on the borrower were in the clear majority, my devil’s advocate instincts and my normal tendency of siding with the weaker inspired me to take a very strong position in favor of allowing for a more frequent use of the countries’ own systems. </div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Let them bike</b></div><div><br />Friends, listening to your exhaustive list of concerns, I was reminded of the moments when I had to teach my daughters how to ride their bikes: I heard their mother’s anxious calls in the background; I felt my own nervousness; nonetheless, I just knew I had to let them go.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">One could find and read thousands of manuals about how to put a bike together safely; about all the safety implements a kid should wear, such as helmet and wrist-guards; about all the precautions he or she needs to take, not going downhill or out on the main road; but nowhere can you find even a single manual that clearly and exactly instructs you how to learn to ride a bike. Left leg up, right leg down! Or was it right leg up first? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">We need to understand that development is a bit like learning how to ride a bike and, at the end of the day it is something that must be done on one’s own. In fact, no matter how much we could help in the preparations, we will not stand a chance to achieve lasting results if we are not willing or do not know how to let them go. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is not easy to let go, I probably even closed my eyes for fractions of seconds after letting my girls roll away on their bikes, but I let them go and they know how to ride a bike now. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So, my colleagues, in these discussions, not as caring parents but as caring development partners, let us try to act accordingly, letting them go, always remembering that, at the end of the day, countries need to do it on their own. What else could ownership mean?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Of course, anyone might fall trying, but that is exactly the risk we need to be able to take if they are going to achieve real sustainable development results and, if they fall, there is probably nothing more to do than to help them rebuild their confidence so that they can just have another go at it.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Moreover, if you try to hold the bike while they ride it, the bike might not really behave like a bike, and so they might never get the hang of it. What we really should be concerned about is that they have what is most needed at the time of trying: sufficient confidence in themselves. In fact, what unwillingly might be the first victim of all our other secondary concerns is precisely that, their confidence. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So, my colleagues, let them go, again and again and again, learning to ride their bike, and as they believe a bike should be ridden.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">P.S. I know it is not as easy as it sounds and in fact I would only give someone the freedom to try it on their own whenever he or she convinces me she or he is ready for it and is sufficiently confident.</div></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-14210436164978495582006-08-16T08:52:00.002-04:002023-10-16T08:55:05.677-04:00Let the Bank Stand Up<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Dear Friends and Colleagues, </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">After having identified in our Review of the Financial Sector Assessment Program the problems of: “(i) weak credit culture with the prevalence of non-payments mechanism that undermine the development of the formal financial sector; (ii) limited access to formal, affordable financing by small and medium enterprises, a typical development trap in transition economies; and (iii) the slow pace of banking sector consolidation,” it is shameful to observe that the only recommendations we put forward are “(i) enhancement of the central bank’s ability to deal with insolvent banks, (ii) strengthening of penalty provisions, and (iii) increasing minimum capital requirements.” Come on! </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">We all know that risk aversion comes at a cost, a cost that might be acceptable for developed and industrialized countries, but that might be too high for poor and developing ones and, in this respect the Bank has the responsibility of helping developing countries to strike a right balance between risks and growth possibilities. Please, let us never forget that the other side of the Basel coin might be many unique developing opportunities (credits) forgone. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Why do I make these comments with such candor? Besides having been alerted during many years about the consequences of a Financial Puritanism that seems to be invading the world—and that does not get the real culprits either—in the specific case of my country, the combined portfolio of credits in commercial banks fell in real terms from about US$ 16,000 million in 1982, to only about US$ 4,000 by 1997. In such scenario, to then hear about Basel and its prudence regulations reminds me of the makeup of a corpse already in rigor mortis although I should perhaps note that in the case of this particular corpse, even almost six feet under, it has anyhow been able to generate surprisingly large profits, for itself.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In the area of risk management in finance, it might be an appropriate time to remember what Franklin Delano Roosevelt said in his First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933, namely that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” and so in this respect we very much need the Knowledge Bank to evolve more into a Wisdom Bank or at least a more humble Common Sense Bank.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In a seminar on housing finance we heard that “Basel is getting to be a big rule book,” and, to tell you the truth, the sole chance the world has of avoiding the risk that Bank Regulators in Basel, accounting standard boards, and credit-rating agencies will introduce serious and fatal systemic risks into the world is by having an entity like the World Bank stand up to them—instead of rather fatalistically accepting their dictates and duly harmonizing with the International Monetary Fund. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">As a small example, let me remind you that the World Bank has for some time and to no avail argued with respect to its own accounting that were it to follow strictly the current accounting rules, its financial reports would not reflect reality. Well, if the Bank has difficulties, imagine the rest of the world. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Per</span></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-53570650776065573572006-08-16T08:41:00.007-04:002023-11-11T07:46:11.539-05:00About El Zamorano and the use of country systems<p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Dear colleagues,</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Traveling in Honduras recently, I heard on the radio the old rock band <i>Enanitos Verdes</i> singing about having to run the risk of getting up, in order to keep on falling, and it reminded me of our recent discussions about “use-of-country-systems” where I gave you my mumbo jumbo about having to let them go, since this is the only way they could learn how to ride a bike. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I was on my way to visit the agricultural school <i>El Zamorano</i>, cajoled (with no major effort needed) by one of its graduates—a friend of ours, Jorge Wong, and little did I know I was heading into true learning-how-to-bike land. The motto of this most amazing school is “learning while doing” and … Boy, do they! Boy, do they learn!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In <i>El Zamorano</i>, kids have a school year of 11 months and are rigorously awakened every morning at 5 am—hellish but I tell you that it has been a long time since I’ve seen such a group of enthusiastic, happy, and feeling-good-about-the-future young faces. There are about eight hundred boarding students, of whom more than two hundred are girls. They come from many Latin American countries, from all backgrounds, and any differences are neutralized with education, companionship, and uniforms. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Along with their formal academic classroom studies, the kids, from seventeen to twenty-three, are taught about every imaginable (and also some you-do-not-want-to-imagine) agricultural and farm chore there is, by being handled full responsibility for doing them. They grow crops, milk cows and in the industrial installations where they produce cheeses, juices, marmalades, sausages, and much more that they sell in Honduran supermarkets, the managers are the students from senior grades and the workers their younger friends. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">And <i>El Zamorano</i> goes way beyond teaching knowledge. When I heard some kids explain to me about the biologic pesticides they develop and market all over Central America, could it be to make it the “Green Subcontinent”? It became clear that besides algebra, they must have gotten lectures on confidence building, communication skills, and character formation too.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Although I was told that in the dry season the landscape changes somewhat, <i>El Zamorano</i> as I saw it lay snuggled in a beautiful valley, where it has about 10,000 acres of land and great and functional facilities. This <i>El Zamorano</i> seed effort is more than ready for some heavy-duty scaling-up, and they have already started doing so with some interesting and substantial extension programs, reaching out to their neighboring communities. Envying their tremendous educational expertise, I am already on my knees, begging them to branch out into my favorite Central American growth program—you bet, those who know me: educating doctors specialized in geriatric ailments and bilingual nurses, certified by schools and health authorities of developed nations.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In the last couple of weeks we have been reminded of some of Ronald Reagan’s “one-liners” (slogans), among them, “trust but verify.” It is clear that we face serious challenges when monitoring or verifying the results of our projects, but, frankly, after having been in <i>El Zamorano</i>, I am convinced that it is exactly in the trusting department where we really are in the backwaters. We need not worry, though. <i>El Zamorano</i> was founded three years before the World Bank, and so we still have a chance to catch up. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Back in D.C., on my radio, Juan Manuel Serrat was singing about Africa—something about the world not letting it go, yet not holding onto it.</span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOUPuwifEXqjW2t3AXIQRIIiSVSjdWoKJ115_1O2xk7Up28sxmXiAxlyOT9qMvxevcRduMbRFfWrsn4oILUElE4usQ8r9zp2xoFOgR-qsCzmxKqU6HTDDKnZwbEJQCh8mYHWQeT76O3e4X_bpgEiB3-UpceP1m4Taaa2I5Kt89kl4dkZdYFS2t/s2048/8Z2%20Zamorano%20breakfast.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOUPuwifEXqjW2t3AXIQRIIiSVSjdWoKJ115_1O2xk7Up28sxmXiAxlyOT9qMvxevcRduMbRFfWrsn4oILUElE4usQ8r9zp2xoFOgR-qsCzmxKqU6HTDDKnZwbEJQCh8mYHWQeT76O3e4X_bpgEiB3-UpceP1m4Taaa2I5Kt89kl4dkZdYFS2t/s320/8Z2%20Zamorano%20breakfast.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><p></p>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-78678415506600597652006-08-16T08:08:00.006-04:002023-10-16T09:35:32.530-04:00Towards a countercyclical Basel?<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;">(A letter <i>FT</i> did not publish)<span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="break-after: avoid; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><br /></p></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Sir, the financial system is there to safeguard savings, to generate economic growth by channeling investments, and to promote equality by providing full and free access to capital and opportunities.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Currently, our bank regulators headquartered in Basel are primarily concerned with the first goal, that of avoiding bank collapses, and how could it be otherwise, if you have only firemen on the board that regulates building permits.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Now, one of these days, the financial system, neatly combed and dressed in a tuxedo, but lying more than seven feet under in the coffin of financial de-intermediation, is going to wake up to the fact that it needs the presence of others in Basel. At that moment, perhaps we might start hearing about flexible capital requirements, moving up to 8.2 % or down to 7.8% by region, in response to countercyclical needs.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Meanwhile it’s a shame that even their first goal might turn out to be elusive, since although the individual risks have fallen with Basel regulations, the stakes have increased, as those same regulations accelerate the tendency towards fewer and fewer banks.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">PS. While being an Executive Director of the World Bank I sent this letter to the Financial Times. It was not published. But, because of its importance, I included it here.</span></div><div><br /></div>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-81353824249142077792006-08-15T12:21:00.000-04:002022-11-29T12:31:48.207-05:00 Motorbikes<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· A hoard of motorbikes is coming at me. How on earth am I going to cross the street? At the end—just like marrying—there comes a moment of truth when you just have to close your eyes and walk down that aisle to the altar with faith. I did just that, closed my eyes, and crossed the street. I did great! Just as in my marriage. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· There are too many motorbikes on this road so they should build a bike lane. Forget it! There are so many motorbikes that what we need here is a car lane. Boy, if they just went from bicycles to motorcycles, and last year over 1 million motorcycles were sold, which at only a thousand US dollars each means more than a billion in sales, just think what would happen if they went over to cars! With what would they power those cars? Has anyone considered this in the Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) of this country?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">· But these motorbikes must be different from the motorbikes we used to know. We cannot even begin to fathom their significance in the local supply chain before we have witnessed the transport on a motorcycle of … FOUR FULL-GROWN PIGS!</span></div><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
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</style>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18326095.post-40635046776006142202006-08-15T10:28:00.003-04:002024-03-19T10:39:49.905-04:00A monument to transparency<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I have no idea what is to come out of it and I have no idea whether it has anything to do with true accountability but, in my book at least, The 9/11 Commission Report, that in its 567 pages contains the Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, and that can be bought in any supermarket for less than ten dollars is a true monument to transparency. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: medium;">I cannot imagine any other country being able to come out with so much information on a so sensitive a public issue in so short a time after the events. We, the rest of the world, should stand in awe in front of it! That, of course, does not imply not being critical of many other things going on in the United States, that land of contradictions.</span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Per Kurowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14155373607182051840noreply@blogger.com