"As far as we're concerned, the loss of 60,000 jobs during 2008 was not the result of the economic crisis, but of the dollar crisis. We warned that there would be layoffs on this scale, and it was considered nonsense, but the economy did in fact lose 60,000 jobs," said Manufacturers Association president Shraga Brosh in his opening remarks at the annual Deloitte Brightman Almagor Zohar and Manufacturers Association of Israel.
Brosh added, "It must be realized that recovery won't come from the financial market, but from the manufacturing sector. When we grew by 12% a year in the past five years, the economy grew by more than 5%. We account for 45% of growth. Our Expectations in Industry survey shows that if the shekel-dollar exchange rate is around NIS 3.60/$, more employees will be fired and we'll lose $1.5 billion in exports. This leads to the conclusion that even if the global economy recovers, the question remains: what will our part be in the recovery?"
Brosh reiterated that the shekel-dollar exchange rate was the core of the problem. "There is no doubt that the governor of the Bank of Israel is doing welcome work. Even we didn’t dare to ask him to buy dollars. But it's no secret that he's reaching his limit on the dollar issue. Nonetheless, there's no doubt that the US dollar has not run its course. America won't turn into a pitiful country; it will strengthen within a couple of years and the dollar will make a comeback."
Brosh added, "It's impossible to want to correct all the world's ills that we've suffered in the past 61 years right now. If someone thinks that the price of water has been a terrible mistake all these years, so precisely now he has raised the price of water by 50%? Why triple port fees for exporters now? There was terrible distortion for 60 years; we can have distortion for another year and deal with it then."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 30, 2009
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