Валовий внутрішній продукт у 2016 році зріс на 2,3% після падіння у 2015-му на 9,8%, повідомляє Державна служба статистики. За оприлюдненими даними, номінальний ВВП минулого року становив 2,38 трильйони гривень, що становить 55,8 тисяч гривень на одну особу.

Зростання ВВП у 2016-му зафіксували вперше за чотири роки, йдеться у повідомленні. Розрахунки велися на підконтрольних Києву територіях України.

20 березня Національний банк переглянув прогноз зростання валового внутрішнього продукту України у 2017 році, погіршивши його з 2,8% до 1,9% у зв’язку з тимчасовим припиненням переміщення вантажів через лінію розмежування на Донбасі.
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The University of Southern California each year hosts the African Economic and Development Summit, bringing delegations of African business leaders, government officials and others to network with their counterparts in the U.S. But this year, the African summit has no Africans. All were denied visas. Michelle Quinn reports from Los Angeles.
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The World Bank reports Africa will receive the bulk of the $75 billion the International Development Association, or IDA, will spend to finance life-saving and life-changing operations over the next three years mainly in 30 of the world’s poorest, most fragile countries.

The IDA is a part of the World Bank which supports anti-poverty programs in the most poor developing countries through long-term, no interest loans.

The World Bank reports the African region will receive $45 billion of the $75 billion allocated for development purposes. It says other recipients will include small Pacific island states threatened by climate change and fragile countries in the Western Hemisphere, such as Haiti.

The fund, which runs from July 1 through June 30, 2020, also will support specific development projects in 82 additional fragile states, including Guinea, Nepal, Niger, and Tajikistan.

Axel van Trotsenburg, vice president for Development Programs at the World Bank, says the aid package will make a huge difference in the lives of hundreds of millions of people. For example, he says it could deliver essential health and nutrition services for up to 400 million people.

“We will or expect to train up to 10 million teachers to benefit 300-plus million children. We intend to immunize between 130 and 180 million children… and would undertake investments that could improve the access to improved water resources for up to 45 million people,” he said.

Long-term and emergency assistance 

While IDA is largely focused on supporting long-term development projects, it does have provisions for helping people in crisis situations. Van Trotsenburg tells VOA that IDA has just announced a $1.6 billion support package for emergencies, with critical support going for famine relief in Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia, and northern Nigeria, where an estimated 20 million people are at risk of famine.

“The financial support will be a combination of recently approved operations that we have been in the last six, eight months that were already started to target, for example, the north of Nigeria to the remaining resources that are still available in our crisis response window,” he said.

Van Trotsenburg says IDA still has about $360 million left over from development projects executed over the past three years. He says that money will be used for famine relief.
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There was bad news for the United Nations last week, as President Donald Trump announced he is seeking a 28 percent budget cut for diplomacy and foreign aid, which includes an unspecified reduction in funding to the United Nations and its agencies. VOA’s U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer reports that the potential cuts come as the U.N. is struggling to cope with an unprecedented number of conflicts, approaching famines and the effects of climate change.
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China, the world’s third-largest bond market accounting for $9 trillion in debt instruments, has started the process of opening up to foreign investors. Two major investment banks, including Citigroup, have announced plans to join the fray and several others are expectantly watching the unfolding situation.

It’s not a sudden desire to liberalize, but pressure from shrinking foreign capital inflows and expanding outflows that has motivated Beijing’s communist leaders into this new and uncertain path.

“China’s purpose is to attract capital inflows from investors needing RMB [Chinese yuan] assets for their portfolio,” said Jacob Kirkegaard, economist with the Peterson Institute of International Affairs. “This will also help to stabilize RMB exchange rate.”

China has suffered some serious loss of capital because of uncontrolled outflows and a recent decline in its foreign direct investments, which saw a drop of 9.2 percent in January. The country also suffered its first trade deficit in three years last month.

To overcome the situation, Beijing recently allowed overseas investors to hedge their currency risks at the local derivative market. This partially opened the doors to foreign players who saw currency risk as a major deterrent in the Chinese bond market.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang threw in a sweetener in mid-February, saying the government would launch a trial program to connect the bond market in mainland China with Hong Kong, which is the base of operations for a large number of foreign investors. The bond connect will make it easier for Hong Kong-based investors to access domestic Chinese instruments without leaving the city.

“I see that as a part of China of becoming a major player and becoming an important destination for financial investors, ” Lourdes Casanova, Director of Emerging Markets Institute at Cornell University’s SC Johnson School of Management, said.

International currency

This move is also meant to promote the use of RMB as an international currency.

“These efforts indicate that China wants to assert its economic, business and financial power with all the inherent advantages and risks,” Casanova said.

The past few weeks have seen Bloomberg Barclays become the first major index provider to include Chinese yuan bonds in its global offerings. Citigroup has announced plans to embed China bonds into its bond market benchmark WGBI-Extended. JPMorgan Chase & Co., another index maker, said it is evaluating the entry of China markets into its JPMorgan Global Emerging Market Bond Index.

This is not surprising because the RMB, or the Chinese yuan, is now part of the International Monetary Fund’s coveted special drawing-rights basket.

“There are global investors who wish to shadow the IMF SDR basket, and needs RMB exposure,” Kirkegaard said.

At present, foreign investments account for just about $120 billion, or 1.33 percent, of China’s bond market. But the situation is expected to change soon as investment banks and index makers have started the process of measuring steps before entering the market in a big way.

Given China’s role as the second-biggest economy, it is natural for Chinese investors to want Chinese bonds in their portfolio, Casanova said. In fact, foreign investors face fewer challenges in China’s bond market compared to what they are up to in other emerging markets, she said.

“Yes, there are many doubts, there are many doubts in many countries. I am European, I am from Spain, there are doubts about the viability of the euro. In the U.S. there are other types of worries,” she said adding, “That’s why also for the international investors, China is not as risky as it used to be.”

Casanova said, “The risk of default is minimal given the amount of Chinese reserves and the risk related to currency swings are also much less than, let’s say, Argentina, which has been issuing debt recently.”

Doubts and challenges

But foreign investors will have to tread carefully because it is not easy to seriously analyze credit risk in China where the markets are not transparent and there is not much information available about issuers and major buyers of debt instruments, he said.

“Their [foreign investors’] willingness to invest will be dependent on the implicit government guarantee against default… foreign investors won’t be able to seriously analyze credit risk in China,” he said.

Casanova sees the situation differently. She points out there are risks in most markets across the globe, and international investors will choose what suits them best.
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke up for free trade at a major technology fair on Sunday with jabs clearly pointed at an increasingly protectionist United States.

Both called for a free trade deal to be reached quickly between Japan and the European Union, in comments made after G-20 finance ministers and central bankers dropped a long-standing mention of open trade in their final communique after a two-day meeting in Germany.

Neither leader named the U.S. government as they opened the CeBIT technology fair in Hanover, but both used the opportunity to distance themselves from protectionist tendencies coming from the Trump administration.

“In times when we have to argue with many about free trade, open borders and democratic values, it’s a good sign that Japan and Germany no longer argue about this but rather are seeking to shape the future in a way that benefits people,” Merkel said.

As G-20 president, Germany feels especially committed to these principles, she added.

After meeting President Donald Trump in Washington on Friday for the first time, Merkel said she hoped the United States and the European Union could resume discussions on a trade agreement. Trump said he did not believe in isolationism but that trade policy should be fairer.

Merkel stressed that Germany was strongly in favour of free trade and open markets.

“We certainly don’t want any barriers but at a time of an ‘Internet of things’ we want to link our societies with one another and let them deal fairly with one another, and that is what free trade is all about,” she said.

Speaking at the same event, Abe said: “Japan, having gone through reaping in abundance the benefits of free trade and investment, wants to be the champion upholding open systems alongside Germany.”

He added: “Of course to do so it will be necessary to have rules that are fair and can stand up to democratic appraisal.”

He also said the European Union and Japan should soon reach an economic deal. Merkel welcomed his comments, saying: “It’s very, very good that Japan says we want a free trade agreement, we want it soon because that could be the right statement and Germany would love to be a driving force behind this.”

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told Bild am Sonntag newspaper he was pleased that he would be meeting Abe on Tuesday and said the bloc wanted to conclude a free trade deal with Japan this year.
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Всі українські банки з російським капіталом ведуть переговори про продаж, повідомила заступник голови Національного банку України Катерина Рожкова 19 березня в ефірі телеканалу «Інтер».

«Ми абсолютно точно знаємо, що всі банки з державним російським капіталом, які працюють сьогодні в Україні, ведуть переговори про потенційно можливий продаж. І ми, як регулятор банківського ринку, вважаємо, що це найкращий спосіб покинути ринок України, тому що в сьогоднішніх умовах, на жаль, про якийсь подальший розвиток цих банків на території України говорити, звичайно, не можна», – повідомила Рожкова.

За її словами, нині в банках з державним російським капіталом зосереджено близько 21 мільярда гривень вкладів, з яких гарантується Фондом (гарантування вкладів – ред.) 8,5 мільярда гривень.

«Ці банки докапіталізовані, банки мають достатню кількість активів, в тому числі ліквідних активів, для того, щоб виконувати вимоги перед своїми клієнтами… Це цивілізований спосіб продати банк, при цьому цей банк залишиться працювати, він буде точно так само продовжувати кредитувати економіку, обслуговувати клієнтів, але у нього буде інший власник», – додала Рожкова.

16 березня Національний банк України повідомив, що на виконання рішення РНБО пропонує ввести санкції щодо українських банків з російським державним капіталом. Йшлося про обмеження для «Сбербанку», ВТБ, VS банку, БМ Банку та «Промінвестбанку». Завдяки запровадженню санкцій, заявили в НБУ, українські банки з державним російським капіталом не зможуть будь-яким чином виводити за межі країни кошти на материнські компанії в Росії.

7 березня «Сбербанк Росії» повідомив, що «готовий до обслуговування осіб, які звернулися з «паспортами» «ДНР» і «ЛНР», у всіх філіях банку». У відповідь міністр внутрішніх справ України Арсен Аваков закликав Нацбанк застосувати санкції до цієї фінансової установи. Згодом дочірній банк «Сбербанку Росії» в Україні – ПАТ «Сбербанк» – заявив, що не обслуговує фізичних і юридичних осіб на підставі документів, виданих на непідконтрольних українській владі територіях. Деякі активісти в Україні вимагали заборони діяльності російських банків, зокрема і «Сбербанку».
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Національний банк України має намір 20 березня провести позачергове засідання комітету з монетарної політики для оновлення макроекономічних прогнозів з врахуванням ефекту введення торговельної блокади непідконтрольних українській владі територій Донбасу. 

«Національний банк планує оновити макроекономічні прогнози з урахуванням ефекту торговельної блокади ОРДЛО. З цією метою в понеділок, 20 березня, відбудеться позачергове засідання комітету НБУ з монетарної політики. Оновлені макропрогнози будуть надані МВФ», – йдеться у повідомленні відомства у Facebook.

У Нацбанку додають, що діалог і технічні консультації з МВФ тривають. 

Останній перебіг подій в Україні потребує додаткового вивчення їх потенційного впливу на економіку і його урахування в макроекономічних прогнозах програми співпраці з МВФ, додають у Національному банку.

У графіку засідання ради директорів Міжнародного валютного фонду 20 березня немає питання щодо надання Україні чергового траншу, хоча раніше цього дня планувався розгляд цього питання. У Мінфіні України це пояснили необхідністю уточнення розрахунків, зокрема, наслідків від заходів, застосованих Україною у відповідь на блокаду.

Цього тижня Рада національної безпеки й оборони України 15 березня ухвалила рішення тимчасово припинити переміщення вантажів через лінію розмежування в зоні збройного конфлікту на сході України.

Загальна сума нинішньої позики Україні від МВФ має скласти 17,5 мільярдів доларів, але чергові її транші вже не раз затримувалися через недостатній поступ Києва з реформами.
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У Міністерстві фінансів України пояснюють перенесення МВФ розгляду питання щодо України потребою в уточненні розрахунків.

Як повідомляє прес-служба міністерства, перенесення викликане винятково потребою уточнення розрахунків щодо економічних наслідків від заходів, застосованих Україною у відповідь на блокаду, та захоплення українських підприємств на непідконтрольних уряду територіях Донбасу, а також у зв’язку з визнанням російською стороною документів, виданих на цих територіях.

«Уточнення цих розрахунків важливе для обох сторін задля максимальної ефективності програми. Відповідні консультації вже розпочато. Плануємо їх завершити у найкоротші терміни», – сказав міністр фінансів Олександр Данилюк.

У графіку засідання ради директорів Міжнародного валютного фонду 20 березня немає питання щодо надання Україні чергового траншу, хоча раніше цього дня планувався розгляд цього питання.

Надання цього траншу залежало від ухвалення в Україні підтриманого МВФ бюджету на 2017 рік і реформ у банківській сфері.

Загальна сума нинішньої позики Україні від МВФ має скласти 17,5 мільярдів доларів, але чергові її транші вже не раз затримувалися через недостатній поступ Києва з реформами.
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said the meeting of finance ministers of the G20 countries was a success Saturday despite the ministers not reaching agreement on trade protectionism.

“I will leave here confident that my colleagues and I are able to work in partnership to …foster and promote global growth and financial stability,” he said.

Citing President Donald Trump’s commitment to American companies and workers, Mnuchin pushed back on and effectively omitted a ban on protectionism from the joint statement released at the end of the summit.

Mnuchin did, however, say that the United States still believed in free trade.

“We believe in free trade, we’re one of the largest markets in the world, we’re one of the largest trading partners in the world,” Mnuchin said. “Having said that, we want to re-examine certain agreements,” he continued, speaking specifically about NAFTA.

Other world powers present played down any disagreement between the countries.

“It’s not true we are not agreed. It’s completely clear we are not for protectionism,” Wolfgang Schaeuble, finance minister of host country Germany, told reporters, though he did, without mentioning a country by name, say that “maybe one or the other important member state needs to get a sense of how international cooperation works.”

The G20 is a informal forum on economic cooperation between 19 countries plus the European Union. Representatives from the 19 countries and the EU will meet for a formal summit in July.

 
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In Greece’s grinding economic crisis, a home for abused children is now taking in those whose parents are struggling to feed them.

It is perhaps the darkest sign of economic devastation in Greece, where traditionally strong family ties are starting to crumble after years of depression.

A quarter of Greece’s workforce is unemployed and a quarter of its children live in poverty, according to United Nations figures, forcing parents to depend on grandparents for handouts.

But pensions too have been cut a dozen times.

In Athens, the Model National Nursery, set up a century ago for orphans of war, can hardly keep up with the number of parents turning to it for help. Unable to cover their basic needs, parents leave their children in the home all week.

Iro Zervaki, its head, says at least 40 children are on the waiting list, four times as many as a couple of years ago.

The home sleeps 25 in a bare room with rows of beds draped in blue blankets, and lacks the staff and funds to increase capacity, she said. Most places are for abused children.

Dozens of other children, all aged two to five, come in daily, but the days away from their parents are long.

“We had incidents where children even attempted to leave, to run away, to go to their mother,” Zervaki said.

In the buzzing playground, a little girl tugged the social worker’s blouse and yelled: “Miss! When will I go to my mum?” “They can’t tell the days apart so every day they ask: ‘Is it Friday?'” Anthoula Zarmakoupi, the social worker, said. “They know mum will pick them up at the weekend.”

But sometimes even that was not possible, she said. “We have children whose parents are homeless so it’s very difficult for them to even collect them for the weekend.”

For the home too, brighter days seem as far away as ever.

State funding has been cut and covers just half of the staff’s wages. The home depends on donations for food and clothes, and Zervaki says it is hard to tell if she will be able to make next month’s payments.

“It doesn’t look like tomorrow will be any better,” she said. “It will take some years. I hope not too many.”
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It could be a Hollywood screenplay. Juliana Armelin and her husband Paulo Siqueira decided to radically change their lives in 2010, quitting jobs in Sao Paulo’s financial sector and moving to a farm seven hours away to start growing coffee.

Seven years later, they clinched for a second consecutive year Brazil’s most prestigious coffee award, beating hundreds of established producers in a country that has exported coffee for more than 200 years.

“I would never imagine we could reach this status in such a short period,” Siqueira told Reuters on Friday after the couple received the annual award from Italian roaster Illy.

“I used to say that we don’t have a story on coffee, but only some chapters so far,” said Armelin.

The couple met during college, graduating in engineering from Brazil’s top ranked university, USP. They spent some years together in the United States getting Master of Business Administration degrees at the University of Chicago before starting careers in Sao Paulo.

Armelin is a former Mckinsey & Company consultant, while Siqueira held positions as a fund manager at Credit Suisse and boutique investment firm Vector Investimentos.

They ended up in the coffee business due to Armelin’s father, who decided to start producing the beans.

“I helped him in the research and started to like the idea.

We already had thoughts at running something together,” Armelin said.

After studying the possibility, they bought a 210-hectare (518 acres) farm in the municipality of Ibiá in a coffee-producing region known as the Cerrado Mineiro, in Minas Gerais state.

“It was an old cattle ranch, only pasture,” Siqueira recalled. They planted the first trees in 2011, collected the first beans two years later and had their first full harvest in 2015. Within a year, they received the first award.

The couple’s farm is a state-of-the-art facility. The fields are 100 percent irrigated, with a fully mechanized harvest. The washed arabicas are put to dry in raised beds to avoid contact with the soil, which could affect the flavor.

“We studied a lot, talked to a lot of people who knew how to produce high quality coffee and we did everything they said we should,” said Armelin. “Some people used to say that we were nerds that went to coffee production. And we used to say, ‘yes, we are.'”

The Terra Alta farm was chosen for aspects like the plentiful availability of water and its flat terrain to allow for mechanization.

The couple used as much government-backed credit as they could to buy all the equipment. “We have debt for the rest of our lives,” said Armelin, smiling.

The farm today exports 80 percent of its production, which varies from 10,000 to 13,000 60-kg bags per year. Many deals are done directly with gourmet coffee sellers in the United States.

Siquiera said the coffee community in the Cerrado region has always been very receptive, despite their unusual background.

But the couple stops short of recommending their experience to others.

“Even if you have the money, it really is not easy. Growing coffee requires extreme dedication,” Armelin said, adding that she takes care of the financial details while her husband likes to be out in the fields.

But they have no regrets. “We like this a lot. We will probably be coffee growers for the rest of our lives,” she said.
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Airbnb expects to maintain its rapid growth in Africa this year and double its customer numbers to 1.5 million, its Chief Executive Brian Chesky and regional head told Reuters on Friday.

The number of people using the online room rental service on the continent rose by 143 percent to about 765,000 guests in 2016 from the year before, said Nicola D’Elia, the firm’s Africa and Middle East chief.

“If you just look at 2017, it’s going to double, you will have 1.5 million people at the end of this year,” added D’Elia.

Airbnb CEO Chesky confirmed that the California-based company expected to double African customer numbers this year.

“Certainly that would be the forecast,” he said in an interview in Cape Town, adding: “This is literally just the beginning. It [Africa] is still relatively under-penetrated.”

Chesky said the company had 77,000 homes across Africa – out of its 3 million globally – but that it could easily have “hundreds of thousands” in a continent that’s home to over a billion people.

The 77,000 homes represented an increase of 95 percent from 2015 to 2016, the company said.

South Africa, which was an early adopter of Airbnb, is the top-ranked country in Africa in terms of listings and visitors, who mainly come from the United States, Germany, Britain and the Netherlands.

The top five cities in Africa are Cape Town, Marrakesh, Johannesburg, Nairobi and Casablanca, although listings are found in diverse locations from St Helena island in the south Atlantic Ocean to Freetown in Sierra Leone, and even a smattering in Somalia.

Chesky, who described Africa as “an incredibly exciting emerging market for travel”, was speaking to Reuters in Langa, Cape Town’s oldest township where he put in an appearance to surprise graduates from an Airbnb training program.    
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Кабінет міністрів України наполягає на зниженні облікової ставки Національним банком, повідомив прем’єр-міністр Володимир Гройсман у Верховній Раді.

«Щодо кредитної політики позиція уряду така – ми вважаємо, що Національний банк України повинен робити більше серйозні й істотніші кроки з здешевлення кредитів в економіку нашої країни… Уже відбувається зниження облікової ставки, але не так суттєво, як нам би хотілося. Наполягатимемо на тому, щоб цю роботу було прискорено», – заявив прем’єр на годині запитань до уряду у Верховній Раді 17 березня.

На початку березня Національний банк України вирішив залишити облікову ставку на рівні 14%.

У лютому 2017 року, як зазначають у Нацбанку, інфляція у річному вимірі продовжила очікувано прискорюватися.

У березні 2015 року НБУ облікова ставка була на рівні 30%, згодом Нацбанк почав поступово знижувати облікову ставку, зокрема, у жовтні минулого року – до 14 %.

Облікова ставка є одним із інструментів, за допомогою якого Нацбанк встановлює для комерційних банків орієнтир щодо вартості залучених і розміщених коштів. Фактично вона визначає ціну грошей.
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Foreign tourism to the United States, which supports millions of American jobs, is slowing, possibly because President Donald Trump sought controversial travel restrictions on some Muslim-majority nations. Online searches for flights to the United States are down in most major nations, not just those hit by restrictions. Jim Randle reports some travel experts say the push to restrict immigration is making some foreign tourists and students wary of visiting.
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Carmakers and suppliers gave widely differing timelines Thursday for the introduction of self-driving vehicles, showing the uncertainties surrounding the technology as well as a split between cautious established players and bullish new entrants.

Chipmaker Nvidia, facing direct competition with the world’s top chipmaker after Intel’s $15 billion deal to buy Mobileye, an autonomous driving technology firm, this week, gave the most optimistic predictions.

Chief Executive Jens-Hsun Huang said carmakers may speed up their plans in the light of technological advances and that fully self-driving cars could be on the road by 2025.

“Because of deep learning, because of AI [artificial intelligence] computing, we’ve really supercharged our roadmap to autonomous vehicles,” he said in a keynote speech to the Bosch Connected World conference in Berlin.

Germany’s Bosch, however, the world’s biggest automotive supplier, gave a timetable as much as six years longer to get to the final stage before fully autonomous vehicles, and declined even to forecast when a totally self-driving car might take to the streets.

Technology, liability among hurdles

Progress is fraught by issues including who is liable when a self-driving car has an accident, bringing down the costs of sensor technology and guarding against hacking.

“Of course, we still have to prove that an autonomous car does better in driving and has less accidents than a human being,” Bosch CEO Volkmar Denner told a news conference.

Nvidia has applied its market-leading expertise in high-end computer graphics to the intense visualization and simulation needs of autonomous cars, and has been working on artificial intelligence — teaching computers to learn to write their own software code — for a decade.

“No human could write enough code to capture the vast diversity and complexity that we do so easily, called driving,” Huang said.

Together with Bosch executives, Huang presented a prototype AI on-board computer that is expected to go into production by the beginning of the next decade. The computer will use Nvidia’s processing power to interpret data gathered by Bosch sensors.

Degrees of autonomy

On the way to fully self-driving cars, levels of autonomy have been defined, with most cars on the road today at level two, and Tesla ready to switch from level four to five — full autonomy — as soon as it is permitted.

Level three means drivers can turn away in well-understood environments, such as highway driving, but must be ready to take back control, while level four means the automated system can control the vehicle in most environments.

Independent technology analyst Richard Windsor wrote this week that he doubted automakers would have autonomous vehicles leaving factories by a typical self-imposed deadline of 2020, mainly because the liability issue was unresolved.

“This is good news for the automotive industry, which is notoriously slow to adapt to and implement new technology as it will have more time to defend its position against the new entrants,” he wrote.

But Nvidia’s Huang said he expected to have chips available for level three automated driving by the end of this year and in customers’ cars on the road by the end of 2018, with level four chips following the same pattern a year later.

That is at least a year ahead of the plans of most carmakers that have an autonomous-driving strategy.

BMW says market will decide

The head of autonomous driving at BMW told the conference the luxury carmaker was on its way to deliver a level three autonomous car in 2021, but could produce level four or five autonomous cars in the same year.

“We believe we have the chance to make level three, level four and level five doable,” he said. He told Reuters the decision on which levels to release would depend in part on the market, and that cars with more autonomy might first be produced in small batches for single fleets.

Bosch said it saw level three vehicles being released with its on-board computer at the end of the decade, and level four driving not before 2025.

Uber, Baidu and Google spin-off Waymo are testing self-driving taxis, while carmakers including Volvo, Audi and Ford expect to have level four cars on the road by 2020 or 2021.

Nvidia’s Huang predicted those plans would speed up: “In the near future, you’re going to see these schedules pull in.”
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Latin American countries are becoming more reliant on costly fuel imports amid floundering efforts to bolster domestic oil output and expand refinery capacity.

Incomplete reform projects and budget cuts that have stalled investments are aggravating the situation for many Latin American countries. For refiners in the United States, it is a bonus: They have in their own backyard a ready market for rising fuel exports.

Overall, the 30 nations in the region bought 2.32 million barrels per day (bpd) of diesel, gasoline and other fuels last year from the United States, up 67 percent from 2011, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Demands for U.S. imports are rising in the region’s biggest economies, up 199,000 bpd or 29 percent last year in Mexico and 75,000 bpd or 94 percent in Brazil, contributing to the gains.

“We need to build joint ventures to find the capital the refineries require,” said the head of Mexico’s oil regulator, Juan Carlos Zepeda, referring to his own country. “And we need to produce more gas,” he added in comments earlier this month.

But getting there will take time, and in Mexico, energy reform is likely to lead to more imports as the retail market is liberalized, before upstream reforms can boost domestic production.

Cheaper fuel prices have made it easier for these countries to buy in recent years. Latin America’s bill for fuel imports from the United States fell to about $47 billion last year from $51 billion in 2015.

Needs seen growing

But if last year’s imports were measured at 2012’s peak prices, the fuel tab would have been twice as large. Any spike in oil prices would hit countries hard, given the increased volumes they need.

“With demand increasing and a stable refining capacity, the region’s import needs will continue to grow,” said Jake Fuller, a senior analyst at consultants IHS Markit.

American refiners along the Gulf Coast are well-placed to continue supplying the region. In contrast, Latin America’s state-controlled refinery firms have little capital or outside investment interest in expansions or overhauls, Fuller said.

As fuel imports rise, crude shipments from the region’s energy producers are falling. Latin America exported 5.2 million bpd in 2016, according to Reuters Trade Flows figures. The United States buys just under half of the region’s crude exports.

Reforms that encourage producers to bring capital to oilfields are under way in Mexico and Argentina. “We are in the right path,” said Miguel Gutierrez, president of Argentina’s state-run YPF SA, when asked about political change in his country earlier this month.

Refineries wanted

Analysts offer a simple fix for Latin America’s dependence on fuel imports: Build more refineries and halt the subsidies that push up demand. Political realities often collide with such remedies, however.

In Ecuador, Venezuela and some Caribbean nations, heavy consumer subsidies have stymied efforts to attract outside investment.

Mexico this year raised prices on gasoline by up to 20 percent in a move that caused public protests.

“We made this very unpopular move to increase prices. Mexico was along with Ecuador and Venezuela in the group of Latin American countries with the cheapest gasoline in the world,” said Pemex director Jose Antonio Gonzalez Anaya.

Alternative fuels

Brazil is tackling its needs using third-generation fuels from sugar cane and power generated from biomass waste.

“Brazil is in a good position to lead the regional change,” Decio Oddone, director of Brazil’s oil regulator ANP, told Reuters. “Diversity has been key to address the consumption growth.”

Brazil, the world’s second-largest producer of ethanol after the United States, is able to offer gasoline blended with more than 25 percent biofuel thanks to its huge production volumes.

Hydroelectric also provides two-thirds of its power generation.

But for now, Brazil stands out in a region where recent economic struggles have curtailed most investments in such alternative energy sources.
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is headed Friday to his first G-20 meeting of the world’s top financial leaders in Germany with a message that the new administration of President Donald Trump won’t tolerate any countries that try to devalue their currencies to gain an unfair trade advantage.

The U.S. ran a trade deficit of $502 billion last year, the difference between the value of U.S. exports compared to the bigger worth of products it imports. Even as Trump has vowed to end multi-national trade deals, it is a figure that could grow with the strong U.S. dollar, boosting U.S. manufacturing costs and making it more difficult to sell U.S. products overseas.

Trump has complained during his long run to the White House that China’s yuan currency and the eurozone’s euro currency are too weak, giving Beijing and the 19-nation euro currency bloc an unfair trade balance with the U.S. The new president has been particularly vocal in his attacks on China’s currency valuation, even as he is planning a two-day summit next month at his Florida retreat along the Atlantic Ocean with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Mnuchin, aides said this week, plans to “push hard” at the two-day meeting in the German spa resort of Baden-Baden with his finance chief counterparts to reaffirm previous G-20 commitments to avoid competitive currency devaluations.

But European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said last week that it is the U.S. dollar that is overvalued, rather than that the euro is undervalued. China’s premier Li Keqiang, representing the world’s second biggest economy after the U.S., said this week that Beijing does not want a trade war and would not devalue its currency.

Mnuchin could face tough questions from his counterparts about Trump’s withdrawal from the proposed 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership that was championed by former U.S. president Barack Obama and his announced intention to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada. The new president says he favors one-to-one trade deals between the U.S. and other individual countries.

Trump also has said he wants to impose stiff tariffs — perhaps 35 percent — on products manufactured by American businesses at overseas locations that the companies then bring back to sell in the United States. Congress would have to approve such a tariff, which almost certainly would boost the cost of foreign-made goods for American consumers and could ignite a tit-for-tat tariff war with other countries importing U.S. goods.
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The Kenya Association of Manufacturers says the government’s directive to ban plastic bags beginning in September will hurt more than 170 companies and put at least 60,000 people out of work.

The problem is not plastic bags, but consumer behavior, says Phyllis Wakiaga, the association’s chief.

“Issue of waste management is an issue we must admit as a country because all of us are responsible for it,” Wakiaga said. “How we manage our waste at the individual level, at a household level, at the business level, is a concern that all of us. As Kenyans, we should be part of the solution in charting the way forward.”

Many countries in the world, including Kenya, have faced challenges in disposing of the used bags. Many are thrown in the garbage and water streams, though the waste does not break down.

Geoffrey Wahungu, the National Environment Management Authority director general, says the best way to deal with the plastic bags issue is to ban them.

“It takes a generation to change consumer behavior,” Wahungu said. “We do not have that time since there are alternatives, and we do not have to deal with this problem all over until it gets out of hand. We think we need to ban plastic and explore alternatives.”

According to the United Nations environment agency, Kenyan supermarkets use 100 million plastic bags every year. The agency has welcomed the government ban.

The ministry of environment said it had banned the manufacture, use and importation of plastic bags used for commercial and household packaging.

The government tried to ban plastics bags 10 years ago, but the ban failed to be implemented after resistance from the public and manufacturers.

Wahungu says the ban will work because the population is better informed and more supportive.

“In the previous times, Kenyans had not seen the … pollution effect of plastic,” Wahungu said. “Right now, plastic has encroached into the lives of Kenyans. The pollution from plastic and even economic losses from clogging of drainage, flooding, killing livestock; Kenyans are tired of plastics.”

Tanzania and Rwanda have banned plastic bags and called for the total prohibition of them in East Africa.
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Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe says foreign companies that comply with his indigenization law are guaranteed security. His comment is a deviation from his earlier promise that he would revise the policy, which analysts repeatedly have said scares away investors.

At the official launch Thursday of an $82-million cement manufacturing plant by a South African company, PPC Zimbabwe, a frail looking 93-year-old Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said he was happy the company had not resisted the indigenization law, as other foreign companies have done.

“By so doing, PPC Zimbabwe has demonstrated what so many companies are struggling to put in place,” said Mugabe. ” And it has demonstrated also that the indigenization policy and philosophy is no hindrance to foreign investment. But instead the policy guarantees security of such investment.”

The southern African nation passed the controversial indigenization law in 2008, which forces foreign companies to cede 51 percent of their stake to black Zimbabweans. Mugabe argues that indigenization policy is meant to correct colonial imbalances that marginalized blacks in Zimbabwe.

On Thursday, PPC Zimbabwe managing director Kelibone Masiyane did not want to be drawn into the politics of the controversial law while speaking to reporters after Mugabe’s speech.

“I always say the cement business is a 30-year business,” said Masiyane . “So whatever we might be encountering at the moment is only short-term. We are looking into the future, so we are here in Zimbabwe for the long run.”

Last year, indigenization minister Patrick Zhuwawo gave a 90-day ultimatum to foreign companies that had not submitted plans for how they would comply with the indigenization law. He did not implement his threat of revoking their licenses when the deadline passed, which made investors jittery.

Before that, Zimbabwe had nationalized all diamond mining, but some took the matter to court and the cases are still pending.
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Міністр фінансів Олександр Данилюк сподівається, що Україна отримає черговий транш від Міжнародного валютного фонду наступного тижня.

«Наступного понеділка відбудеться зустріч директорів МВФ. Я думаю, наступного тижня ми вже отримаємо транш МВФ», – сказав він.

«Отримання цього траншу буде рекордом для України, оскільки раніше наша країна ніколи не доходила так далеко в програмі співпраці з МВФ», – додав міністр.

На початку березня Міжнародний валютний фонд повідомив, що досяг домовленості з урядом України, що відкриває шлях до надання пізніше цього місяця нового траншу позики, сума якого складе 1 мільярд доларів. Надання цього траншу залежало від ухвалення в Україні підтриманого МВФ бюджету на 2017 рік і реформ у банківській сфері.

Загальна сума нинішньої позики Україні від МВФ має скласти 17,5 мільярдів доларів, але чергові її транші вже не раз затримувалися через недостатній поступ Києва з реформами.
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Блокада переміщення вантажів через лінію розмежування в зоні проведення АТО загрожує економічному зростанню України, уряд шукає шляхи стабілізації ситуації. Про це прем’єр-міністр Володимир Гройсман заявив 16 березня на бізнес-форумі в Києві.

«Сьогодні виникли загрози стримування економічного зростання у зв’язку з блокадою, яка сталася на сході країни. Я вже говорив, і зараз скажу – ця блокада відбувається виключно в інтересах Російської Федерації. Ті, хто розуміють економічні процеси, також розуміють, що це так і є. Зараз ми дивимося на те, що потрібно зробити, щоб утримати ситуацію і забезпечити відповідне зростання», – відзначив голова уряду.

Раніше 16 березня президент України Петро Порошенко вказав, що підприємства з окупованих районів Донбасу, які були зареєстровані на вільній частині України, могли стати «базовими плацдармами при поверненні України на Донбас і поверненні Донбасу в Україну». «Політикани ж своїми безвідповідальними діями знищили «острівки України» на окупованому Донбасі», – вважає Петро Порошенко.

Рада національної безпеки й оборони України 15 березня ухвалила рішення тимчасово припинити переміщення вантажів через лінію розмежування в зоні збройного конфлікту на сході України.

Від січня активісти, серед яких депутати Верховної Ради та люди, що називають себе ветеранами АТО, блокують деякі ділянки залізниці з вимогою припинити, за їхніми словами, торгівлю з окупованими районами Донбасу. Після критики щодо вибірковості такого блокування вони стали розширювати свою акцію, зокрема, й на інші залізничні ділянки та автошляхи, і також блокувати торгівлю з Росією.
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