MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Stiglitz says China demand for better diet will keep Mercosur countries busy
“Incomes in China have risen and the diet is changing and you Latin Americans will benefit from that” The commodities-exporting economies of Latin America will continue expanding in the years ahead, driven by demand from China despite slower growth in its economy, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said during a conference round in Uruguay.
Latin America is reliant on demand from trade partners in Asia, especially China, as well as in Europe and North America.
Stiglitz, a former chief economist for the World Bank, said China's changing diet will keep the tap open for Latin American raw materials even as its economy slows to about 7% growth from 9%.
“That's still enough to keep Latin America growing,” the Columbia University professor said adding that “”I'm hopeful that even with China's growth going somewhere slower, the demand for commodities will continue because their incomes have risen and the diet is changing, you Latin Americans will benefit from that.”
Mercosur members Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay economies depend on agriculture. The region is a top supplier of soybeans and other grains to China, where they are turned into meal to feed cattle.
China's emerging middle class has discovered a taste for beef steak that is expected to continue despite slower growth in the country's GDP and this has been confirmed by growing volumes of imports from Australia, New Zealand but also Uruguay.
Latin America will pick up its pace of economic growth next year to expand between 3.2 and 3.3% as the global economy continues to strengthen, Inter-American Development Bank President Luis Alberto Moreno said late last month. In 2014 Latam grew around half a percentage point higher than the projected 2.7 to 2.8% expansion for this year, Moreno said.
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Read all commentsNobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, the Columbia University professor and a former chief economist for the World Bank.
Dec 20th, 2013 - 03:53 pm 0I bet he has at least three solutions for every problem but won't tell you which one he would pick.
Economists - they have no understanding of the real world.
Every time someone talk good about Latin America, you get all upset, Chris.
Dec 21st, 2013 - 09:42 am 0Why on earth did you choose to live in Uruguay??
@ 2 Stevie
Dec 21st, 2013 - 05:58 pm 0Let me ask you a couple of questions first. Do you believe this guy knows what he is talking about?
And what do people do who invest money in Uruguay and it does turn out to be anything like the truth? Remember Mantega and the 8% or so growth that Brazil was going to do and it turned out to be less than 3%?
“Why on earth did you choose to live in Uruguay??”
We could no longer afford Australia because of the Cunt Brown © Jeremy Clarkson 2010 and needed a much warmer country for my wife because of health problems. We looked at Valparaiso but decided on Uruguay: each is on the 39th Parallel, the same as Kadina in Australia where we would have settled.
We were very impressed with the working people of Uruguay when we came for a month in Feb – Mar 2010. They were very welcoming and did their best to answer us in English. Having stayed for two weeks in PdE we decided it was far too commercialised for us and started looking elsewhere, all along the coast on the way back to MVD.
Perhaps our disappointment with PdE rather dimmed our enthusiasm until we found a very nice single story casa with a sea view that we both thought we would be happy in. Before we came home I signed up an Escribana to act on our behalf and got things moving. We moved into our casa in the first week of May 2011 and have enjoyed our new experiences immensely in getting the place how we want it.
It was then that I began to realise that life for the working people was just like it used to be 50 years ago in the UK. Working five days a week for not that much money and held to ransom by the government and its monopolies over everything.
You cannot understand why I get angry for the people but I am not surprised by this when you see everything about the Tupamaros through rose tinted glasses.
The Tupas Director of Toxicology for Maldonado, her ONLY former experience was as the owner of a pizzeria, FFS. That is the corruption that is Pepe.
Now do you get it?
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