Indirect data suggest that aggregate demand has carried forward positive growth rates, but growth remains significantly below the potential of the Albanian economy. Macroeconomic factors determining private consumption and investments, and a prudent fiscal policy sustain the assessment for contained growth of the domestic demand in the first quarter of the year. Moreover, in the absence of complete data and in real terms on developments in the external sector of the economy, assessments suggest that the contribution of foreign demand to economic growth will be lower than in the past year. Fiscal policy was subject to a consolidation nature over the first quarter of 2012, in line with its objectives to keep budget deficit and public debt in check. The contained fiscal approach has been reflected in minimum public expenditure in the first quarter of the year, with an annualised rate of 0.7%. Furthermore, low growth rates of fiscal revenues continued their trend, settling at 1.2% in this quarter. The budget deficit was ALL 11.5 billion, or about 2.5% down compared with the first quarter of a year earlier. Developments in foreign trade over the first two-month period of the year point to contracted trade exchange in annual terms. Value of exports in these two months dipped by 20.5% against the corresponding period of a year earlier, reflecting the moderation of foreign demand and price developments in global markets. On the imports side, their growth rates were significantly decelerated, reaching a nominal annual growth of 1.8% during this period.
François Villeroy de Galhau: Productivity - a collective enigma? Speech by Mr François Villeroy de Galhau, Governor of the Bank of France, at the Bank of France - France Stratégie Conference, Paris, 1 February 2017. * * * Welcome to all of you. It gives me great pleasure to be able to open this conference on French productivity, organised in conjunction with France Stratégie. The subject is one that is both topical and of great importance to central banks: productivity is one of the principal drivers of growth, and its dynamics are a strong determinant of potential growth, that which is compatible with price stability. As you can see [ slide], after the major wave of expansion witnessed during Les Trente Glorieuses, which was particularly marked in the case of France, productivity growth in advanced countries has slowed in successive stages since the 1970s. Today, it has fallen back to a pace that is historically weak. What are the common factors behind this slowdown in productivity? And is there anything specific to France? I don’t believe so: if there is one thing that is specific to France, it is the high level of hourly productivity – one of the highest in the world, alongside that of the United States and Germany. So, rather than being a French enigma, the enigma we are looking at this morning seems to me to be more of a collective phenomenon.