Jaana Rekolainen, CEO of the Finnish-Russian Chamber of Commerce, is taking part in the Gaidar Forum in Moscow, organized by the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Invest Foresight, the event’s strategic media partner, got a comment from Ms Rekolainen regarding the main global econoomic processes in 2020.
“The United States and China – their trade relations and disputes – will largely determine the development trends for the world economy in 2020. In Europe, Germany traditionally remains the industrial and economic driver. This country has always set development trends for the rest of the euro zone,” Ms Rekolainen said. “In many countries, the economic growth is largely dependent on consumer needs – therefore, consumers’ trust is pivotal for the development.”
“Industries and players acting based on the principles of sustainable development have a great potential, good examples being digital services, smart solutions and bio-based economy,” Jaana Rekolainen believes.
In her view, “Protectionism, trade disputes and progressing political uncertainty remain to be the main challenges for the global economy. Brexit poses the biggest problem on the European scale.”
“There are no simple solutions,” Ms Rekolainen thinks. “Respect for the major areas of open international trade based on the WTO may be one of the keys to general agreement. Politics have become part of international trade. Therefore, turning challenges into opportunities requires curbing political confrontation.”