Tegucigalpa.
He the private sector in Honduras is in a “state of calamity” due to the coronavirus pandemic, which already leaves 3,354 deaths and 134,111 infections and the effects of tropical storms Eta and Iota, so rejects the idea of a new quarantine to stop the uncontrolled advance of the disease.
“The private company is in a state of disrepair, we have ten months in prison and going (to work) half steam because of covid-19 and in November we were affected by two tropical storms,” the president of the Council said -an interview with Efe Honduran from the Private Company (Cohep), Juan Carlos Sikaffy.
Natural phenomena have mainly affected the Sula Valley, in the Caribbean department of Cortés, which extends to part of its neighbor Yoro (north), a region that produces 45% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), which has left “consequences very serious ”for Honduras, he said.
Eight out of ten Hondurans have “serious problems obtaining resources”, so they live in “precarious conditions”, which, he said, worries private companies.
90% of Honduras’ commercial fabric is micro and small businesses, one of the sectors most affected by coronavirus and the storms of Eta and Iota, and “major limitations” did not allow it to be reactivated, he added.
New quarantine
Sikaffy rejected the idea of imposing a new quarantine in Honduras, a measure that the authorities have raised in the face of increasing cases of covid-19 in the country.
A quarantine is “out of context, we have to take care of ourselves, take responsibility for each of us,” said the businessman, who indicated that quarantine “Many more poor people will return” to the country, where informality has increased.
“There are people who go to work today, to eat today or tomorrow, if the source of income is eliminated, they throw more people into poverty, which is very serious, we can reach an unprecedented social breakdown in the country,” he said. .
Honduras is going through a “turning point” and at the moment there is “a great opportunity to rebuild the country”, as multilateral organizations have provided funding, so the Government and business people need to formulate projects that have a greater impact. “On the population,” he explained.
Honduras, a country with 9.3 million inhabitants, has 134,111 cases of covid-19 and 3,354 deaths, and since the end of December there has been a pandemic uprising that pushes the health system to the limit.
Join forces
Almost all sectors of the economy were closed in March last year, through which mechanisms such as contract suspension were applied, and the most important sectors were allowed to open at the end of July.
However, the economic recovery has been slow, so Sikaffy calls on the government to “join forces” with all sectors to “build the country together”.
The main challenges for private companies in Honduras are the rehabilitation and reconstruction of what was destroyed by the storms of Eta and Iota last November, and economic recovery, he warned.
The revival of Honduras’ weak economy means “granting companies credit conditions, guaranteeing the funds that the government must create to recover them,” he explained, and called on business people to reinvent themselves to resume business.
The crisis claimed by employers is patented in the unemployment figures of one million people in the formal sector and more than 1.5 million people with “serious income problems” in the informal sector.
The damage they left And it’s Iota these are equivalent to about 46,000 million lempiras ($ 1,896 million), according to a report by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) quoted by the businessman.
He mentioned that the covid-19 pandemic had hit The Honduran economy and caused losses of at least 18% of GDP, which is the equivalent of 120,000 million lempiras ($ 4,946 million).
Reconstruction plan
In his view, the National Reconstruction Plan announced by the Honduran government should give priority to attacking “human tragedy, rehabilitating what has been destroyed by storms and reviving the economy.”
To do this, Honduras must attract foreign investment, but the country must go “on a path of rebuilding the fact that it is not so vulnerable to climate change,” Sikaffy said.
The government must also guarantee the certainty of foreign investors, clear rules, strong institutions, so that they can be sure that their investments are “safe in the country”.
The country must also fight corruption, an issue “endemic in the country that must be eradicated, we can not stand another second with corruption issues,” he said. Cohep, the main leadership of the Honduran leadership.
“Corruption must be attacked from the roots,” said Sikaffy, who added that the main problem with this scourge is that “there is impunity.”
The business leader also called on health authorities to “make every effort to have the vaccine (against covid-19) as soon as possible”.
The Honduran Institute of Social Security (IHSS) has announced the purchase of 1.4 million doses of covid-19 vaccines from pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, for which Cohep has given a $ 3.4 million guarantee. .