Our country’s last budget announcement was quite positive not only for the Malta Developers Association, but for the whole economy at large.
The rapid and unprecedented growth in inflation, fueled mostly by the consistent rise in energy costs needed head-on attention and this is what the government has delivered, at least in the short term.
Unfortunately, much more than our counterparts, our economy totally depends on fossil fuels, particularly oil and natural gas, to fire our power stations and produce our ever-increasing energy demand.
The stability of utility prices for next year was a breath of fresh air, as at least, from a business perspective, companies and employers can plan without expecting any significant surprises.
The bold move to invest hundreds of millions to continue subsidizing energy will boost further our economy; as families, already struggling with higher food costs and other essentials, will retain a decent level of purchasing power, which, as usually happens, will create more local demand, and economic growth.
The problem of rising energy costs, which is also affected by geopolitical instability and ongoing conflicts among others, is not a new phenomenon and has been with us for the past few years.
The current crisis won’t even be the last as we expect such crisis to re-emerge every few years and other cycles. Therefore, in our opinion, those in power must act and plan ahead.
We cannot continue to glide from one crisis to another. A long-term blueprint is needed and necessary and with the right investment we can avert sudden negative impacts on our economy. This is where the MDA has seen the budget as lacking – the long-term strategy.
The bold move to invest hundreds of millions to continue subsidizing energy will boost further our economy
It is obvious that energy is going to be a dominant factor in our future economic growth. The more we grow, the more consumption we need and the more energy we must produce or import.
For us, the only way forward is smart and greener energy, in which we can invest over the next years to be able to withstand any future challenges. Apart from subsidies, which are important on the short term, we need to put in place strategies and concrete robust schemes to incentivise more and more use of renewable energy.
On this aspect we have already started doing significant improvement, mainly through EU funds, but much more is needed.
the only way forward is smart and greener energy, in which we can invest over the next years to be able to withstand any future challenges
From now, we need to know how much money is going to be invested in installing more PVs over the coming years, how to turn untapped potential spaces on large buildings and car parks into Megawatts and how to make our buildings more environmentally friendly, so that they consume less energy. We can only do this through a national strategy, backed by millions in investment, incentivising everyone to switch to green. The same applies for fuels, mainly used in our transport sector, to turn to more economic options such as electric cars.
We truly believe that this can be done through long term planning, the same as we did in the past years to improve our road infrastructure. For our own sector – which remains one of the few constant resilient economic motors – we are satisfied that once again the government took on board several suggestions and proposals we put forward.
We need to further cut through red tape …so that …more time is invested on productivity
While extending further schemes which proved to be a guaranteed success, such as the schemes related to first-time buyers, the administration has also introduced new measures to keep our industry going. However, bureaucracy – a rallying theme which we have been harping on for years – needs to be taken more seriously.
We need to further cut through red tape and lower the waste of time we developers experience day-in-day out, so that our industry becomes more efficient, and more time is invested on productivity.
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