1. The Honduran economy’s extreme sensitivity to a wide range of shocks—internal and external, endogenous and exogenous—is largely responsible for its pattern of slow and uneven growth punctuated by repeated crashes. Honduras’ economy is small, open, largely agricultural and predominantly informal. A lack of physical and institutional infrastructure, an adverse business climate, burdensome regulations and high security costs discourage investment, inhibit diversification and slow the reallocation of capital and labor, creating structural rigidities on the supply side. Agricultural output is especially vulnerable to both market volatility and exogenous shocks, as the sector focuses on a narrow range of primary commodities produced with limited …show more content…
Although the contribution of mining to GDP has decreased over the last few decades, Honduras is now presented with an important opportunity to explore its untapped mineral potential. Currently, there are only seven metallic mines and about 300 non-metallic mines in Honduras. Yet, the country has significant reserves of iron oxide, and there are about 160 pending permit requests for exploration and feasibility studies. The revised Mining Law passed in April 2013 provides an improved framework to promote investment in the sector. In addition, offshore oil exploration is underway, and a commercially viable discovery could significantly improve the trade balance, encourage foreign investment and bolster government revenues, all of which would help to reinforce macroeconomic stability. However, for extractive industries to effectively promote long-term growth and sustainable social development appropriate transparency and accountability mechanisms must be in place. In light of Honduras fragile ecology, environmental protection must also be accorded a high priority. Finally, high-value extractable resources have a history of fomenting instability in developing countries, and steps must be taken to ensure that any new resource development does not further undermine the rule of …show more content…
Honduras’ macroeconomic profile is expected to improve during 2015-16, as a positive external environment supports critical efforts to strengthen the country’s fiscal position and boost economic growth. Table 5.1 presents Honduras’ medium-term macroeconomic outlook. Growth is expected to recover during 2015-18, with all major sectors contributing. The ongoing recovery in coffee production combined with rising yields for other export-oriented crops will bolster the agricultural sector, while continued growth in manufacturing and construction will have an especially positive impact on employment indicators. Increasing investment will boost the credit supply as the financial sector remains solvent, while expanding internet and telecommunications infrastructure will spur growth in services. Finally, lower oil prices are expected to help reduce the current-account deficit. However, this forecast rests on the assumption that current fiscal consolidation efforts will continue to be implemented as part of a broader program of governance reforms, and that past progress will be maintained. Consequently, a sustained political commitment to the reform agenda is critical to the positive outlook presented
Mexico was one of Citibank's main emerging market customer bases in the early 1990s. After a very rocky relationship through the 1980s, when Mexico's government declared an inability to pay its foreign commercial bank debt, including more than $US 3 billion owed to Citibank, the country had finally returned to a positive growth path and was delivering solid profits to Citibank in both corporate/institutional banking and retail banking. Mexico's economy grew at an annual rate of more than 5% during the 1990-1994 periods. However, the problems of an overvalued currency, heavy inflow of financial investments into high-yield Mexican securities, and political events in 1994 produced a dramatic decline of confidence in Mexico. Mexican and foreign investors saw the January uprising in Chiapas against M...
Where is Honduras located? What are some main landforms? What food do Hondurans eat? What language do Hondurans speak? How did Honduras become Honduras? These are all questions you might have, and in this paper all will be answered. You will learn more about the geography, society, people, their lifestyles, and the history of Honduras.
Ikea is a Swedish company that provides furnished products throughout the world. Ingvar Kamprad founded it in the year of 1943. Its furniture is self-assembled thus allowing the company to reduce its expenditures and offer customers low prices in return. When segmenting a market, IKEA usually focuses on age, income level, and lifestyle. It aims to attract young, underprivileged individuals who look to buy furniture for the first time. An example of this would be college students; they are often confused, doubtful, and looking for something cheap. IKEA currently operates in twenty-seven countries including Korea, China, Sweden, and Netherlands amongst many others (IKEA.com). Although it is
Salvador Gomez is a teenager that helps the broken down the torn up even the poor.
A government objective generally associated with devaluation is the improvement of a trade deficit. If a country’s imports are greater than their exports, devaluing their currency can help, as it reduces the “purchasing power of domestic money in terms of foreign goods and increases the purchasing power of foreign money in terms of domestic goods” (Johnson, 1971). This in effect means domestic goods (exports) become cheaper and imports become more expensive, resulting in an increase in the demand for exports, with a fall in imports, and hence improving the balance of payments. Being South America’s largest oil-producing nation, Venezuela receives most of its export income from this industry. It therefore comes as no surprise that devaluation is so attractive to their policy makers as increased demand for their oil exports would allow them to accumulate more domestic monetary resources. However, an implication of this policy has been the negative effect on the poor who spend the majority of their income on food and other basic necessities that are mainly imported goods. With inflation averaging between 20-30%, this has meant that fewer goods are...
Guatemala is a small country located in the Americans it's barely the size of Tennessee. Guatemala is bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, Honduras to the east and El Salvador to the southeast .(Guatemala by Kari Schuetz ) Guatemala has comfortable weather neither too hot nor cold. Its seasons tend to be divided into 2 parts the wet season and the dry season. From mid-May to October or November it's the wet season it's generally very rainy. From November through April is the dry cooler season with an average of 64°F.
In recent years, the Gross Domestic Product/capita (PPP) in Paraguay has increased significantly in the last decade, with $6,136/capita around $40.9 billion. Paraguay has been one of the fastest growing economies in Latin America, mostly due to an increase in exports of agricultural produce. According to Banco Central del Paraguay, reported “From 2008 until 2013, Paraguay GDP Growth Rate averaged 1.3 Percent reaching an all tim...
Throughout human history, indigenous societies around the world have withered under the expansion of European societies. The “white man’s burden”, which asserted that the colonial powers of the world had the responsibility of bringing education and civilization to other races that were viewed as inferior, was a widely accepted concept in western thinking countries and qualified the removal of indigenous people from their homeland (Kent 2014). Overtime this has led to mass ethnocides, or destruction cultures, around the world (Kent 2014). Many irreplaceable cultures have been adversely
Socializing in Guatemala begins by greeting someone for the first time with a hearty handshake and saying “mucho gusto”. Guatemalans often socialize outside of the home but having friends and relatives to their homes is important.
Mexico’s economy was very unstable and unfair in comparison to the U.S. and Canada’s economic standing. But even though Mexico’s economy was bad, Canada and the U.S. ignored that Mexico wasn’t in any condition to enter as an equal partner (Henderson 121). The overvalued peso in Mexico also caused many problems economically. Since the peso was overvalued for many years, when the peso did float in 1994, it lost 20 percent of its value (Henderson 123). Due to this drastic change to Mexico’s currency, Mexicans were unable to make their payments nor buy goods because the prices rose drastically, which caused many businesses to shut down or lay off their workers (Henderson 123). This was the start of the many problems yet to come because these countries would be trading unequally with Mexico since Mexico didn’t have much to give besides workers who would work for cheap
The economics of Haiti has deceased in the last 4 years after the devastating earthquake that struck it 4 years ago. The Haiti economy has become very poor and one of the poorest country in the south, Central America and Caribbean region making it ranked 24 out of 29 countries in this area and its overall score is below average. Haiti’s economic freedom is 48.1 making it economy the 151st freest country while in the last several years Declines in the management of government spending, freedom from corruption, and labor freedom make its overall score 2.6 points lower than last year. Recovering from the disastrous earthquake in 2010 with the support of the U.S. recovering efforts “Haiti’s post-earthquake reconstruction efforts continue, assisted by substantial aid from the international community. Governing institutions remain weak and inefficient, and overall progress has not been substantial. The parliament has not renewed the mandate of the Interim Haiti Recovery Commission, which had been tasked with overseeing reconstruction efforts but was unpopular.”( .heritage.org). The open market of Haiti trade weighted to be 2.1 this is because the lack of tariffs hamper the trade freedom of Haiti. Foreign investors are given national treatment but the investment is small and the financial sector is remained underdeveloped and does not provide any adequate support.
"No science is immune to the infections of politics and the corruption of power". Many countries in the entire world have been plagued with this reality, one of them being Honduras. Honduras has been truncated from its prosperity for many years by its own demagogue government. Honduran Government falsely proclaims to support its citizens to gain power and be financially assisted. Its warp structured democratic and liberal leadership has only led to the present deceptive administration, poverty, and insecurity.
Brazil’s economic history reflects periods of economic prosperity followed periods of stagnation. The biggest boom was the coffee boom that began in the 19th century. At the turn of the century, Brazil was the supplier of 75% of the global coffee supply accounting for 10% of their GDP (Lowman, 2014). While coffee has served as an important factor of Brazil’s economic success, the fact that their economy was dependent on commodity exports was a major vulnerability in the past. In the 80’s the Brazilian government was forced to reschedule their debt and in the 90’s the country experienced hyperinflation. However with the implementation of the
Warhurst, A. (1999). Mining and the environment: case studies from the Americas. Ottawa, ON, Canada: International Development Research Centre.