Within the framework of the closure of the Andi Colombian Business Congress, the president Gustavo Petro addressed the businessmens for the first time after his possession. During his intervention, he spoke of the joint work that he has to do with the guild for the development of the country.
(Read: The request of the businessmen to Petro: ‘We want signs of confidence’).
In principle, he highlighted as one of the pillars of his government the question of how to create wealth in the country. “LWealth is work. A country is richer if it has more capacity to work than another.said.
The wealth is in the production, for him. Now with that, dstake that there is currently no industrial policy in the country. “We are facing the challenge that without institutions, we have to build an industrial policy because it is in production that wealth is generated,” he explained.
It all begins, for him, with a agrarian reform because the first productive activity is agriculture. “If food becomes cheap, wages are lower and the country’s competitiveness is higher,” he clarifies.
However, for him in Colombia it is still believed that having wealth is having land and not industry. He then recommended a differential property tax around the productivity of the land.
The problem, according to him, is that the growth is being measured in terms of wealth transfers and not the production of it. “We would have to measure behind the GDP what is called growth of the real economy. That is, agriculture, industry, its intermediates and others,” he explained.
If the market is left to act freely, it leads to extinction, for Petro. For this reason, production will not be only in the State nor only in the private sector during its government. The president explained that currently the economic paradigm in the world has collapsed andhe countries are looking for other alternatives where the State appears.
For him, countries cannot grow in contexts of profound social inequality and violence. In this sense, he proposes that in order to industrialize Colombia, a more equitable society must be built that starts from taxes.
“Industrialists should accompany us in a common effort to achieve social equity“, he said. For that, a good distribution of the land is needed, a socially fair tax system and an effective social policy to guarantee universal rights.
(Also: These were the inspiring companies 2022, according to Andi).
The fundamental rights, which allow build social equalitythey have to have a system where the market can be made and the State has an important role, proposes the president.
“The market was not capable of guaranteeing universal rights by itself.“, Explain.
The financing, then, will come from the taxes that part of the country’s production. For him, production does not depend only on businessmen. “If we don’t have connectivity or clean energy, how can we talk about industrialization?” he said.
For Petro, production necessarily needs private capital and the State. Also, that the industrialization policy is designed and conducted by the State. For him, a public-private mission is needed, where the Government conducts a private effort that guarantees effectiveness in the path of industrialization in Colombia.
Among those missions is to end hunger or industrialize the country from clean energy.
That includes allowing only industrial products to be exported, that there is a transition of energies and others. All this, through a social dialogue, modernize the land and tax reform.
For him, the country can become a pioneer in decarbonizing the economy. “To become a fair and equitable society in the immense possibility of being one of the most violent countries in the world to build a society in peace“, he finished.
BRIEFCASE
