Recession Diary part 3
Today I participated in the largest protest ever held in Iceland. It's estimated that more than 6 thousand people gathered together in front of the Icelandic parliament. It was peaceful, lots of banners, people gathered together for a multitude of reasons to show their displeasure with the situation. It's a cold day here in Iceland, the daylight is growing shorter and it feels like the weather is in sync with our situation. Despite the cold people showed up. The demands of those organizing the meeting are simple enough. They want those in charge of our central bank to step down, the same goes people in charge of the Icelandic Financial Supervisory Authority. This makes sense to me. As recently as this summer the IFSA stated that all the Icelandic banks were in fine shape. Seems like the central bank played along and may have even contributed to the crisis through it's efforts. It hasn't helped any that the governing board of the central bank is politically appointed. Since these 2 institutions share some of the blame for our current situation it seems natural to me that we should see new people step in.
I've already mentioned that I attended ICEWEB 2008. The final presentation there was about the need to establish a culture of innovation here in Iceland. It was a really interesting presentation. If we trace the history of Iceland we can see that we've gone through several bubbles. The first one might be called the northern trade bubble. This made Iceland very rich from the time it was settled until around 1200. When that bubble burst, Iceland fell on hard times for about 700 years. In more recent times we've seen other bubbles. One was caused by the failure of herring stocks in the 60's. Iceland at the time was completely dependent in it's foreign currency earnings on fishing. So we started to diversify. We have established some heavy industry and the utilization of our energy resources. This became the second pillar. We've seen the growth of tourism which became the third pillar. Then we established a massive financial industry. Because it was only the 4th pillar, it's collapse has had a devastating effect. Our next step must be to diversify even further. This is why it's so important to enable a culture of innovation. So that the effects of the next bubble, won't affect us in the same manner that this one has. Because if we think about it. Bubbles happen all the time. So a diversified economy is like bubble wrap. If one bursts, there's plenty of others still going. This requires a few changes. For one thing we need a more stable currency. We need open markets and support for those interested in trying out their ideas. In my mind this means that we need to apply for full membership in the EU.
I've already mentioned that I attended ICEWEB 2008. The final presentation there was about the need to establish a culture of innovation here in Iceland. It was a really interesting presentation. If we trace the history of Iceland we can see that we've gone through several bubbles. The first one might be called the northern trade bubble. This made Iceland very rich from the time it was settled until around 1200. When that bubble burst, Iceland fell on hard times for about 700 years. In more recent times we've seen other bubbles. One was caused by the failure of herring stocks in the 60's. Iceland at the time was completely dependent in it's foreign currency earnings on fishing. So we started to diversify. We have established some heavy industry and the utilization of our energy resources. This became the second pillar. We've seen the growth of tourism which became the third pillar. Then we established a massive financial industry. Because it was only the 4th pillar, it's collapse has had a devastating effect. Our next step must be to diversify even further. This is why it's so important to enable a culture of innovation. So that the effects of the next bubble, won't affect us in the same manner that this one has. Because if we think about it. Bubbles happen all the time. So a diversified economy is like bubble wrap. If one bursts, there's plenty of others still going. This requires a few changes. For one thing we need a more stable currency. We need open markets and support for those interested in trying out their ideas. In my mind this means that we need to apply for full membership in the EU.
Ummæli