Exports Need to Increase in Britain
The UK economy was hit hard by the recession and a new report from Ernst & Young suggests that the country will have to make major readjustments in the next decade. Instead of focusing on consumer spending, the country will have to look to exports in the coming years says the report. Consumer spending in the UK can’t carry most of the economy like it once did.
Many local companies will find this to be a very tough transition because they have dealt with UK clients for so long. Looking to the overseas markets will be the only way that they will be able to meet current sales targets in many cases. The Ernst & Young report says that the UK economy has focused much of its energy on the domestic consumer for 10-12 years but that it wouldn’t work going forward. It was said that even a 1% growth rate would be difficult to see in 2010 which is pretty tough for many market analysts to deal with. Chief economic adviser, Peter Spencer said that UK consumers were now essentially cashed out.
Spencer went on to say that domestic spending couldn’t continue at the rate at it had in recent years. The Ernst & Young Item Club report also said spending in the country would increase by less than 0.5% in 2010. These are very low numbers compared to most of the last 20 years. They suggested that it could be very difficult but that firms could grow their global exports in 2010 with a lot of “energy and enterprise”
The team went on to say that this refocus towards overseas trading from the domestic consumer wasn’t going to be an easy transition and that there might be many business causalities. One of the countries that Spencer suggested would be good to focus on is China. The UK has a very low market share in China and it’s expected to be a market that they start focusing resources towards, as the potential is so large. In recent years, Britain has done a lot of business in Asia but has not focused their sights on China as effectively as they could have but Spencer hopes that will change.
The report said that in 2011 they expect to see increases in UK exports but that 2010 could still be slow. Ernst and Young said that 2010 and 2011 would see export increases of 10% and 11%, respectively. This would calm the nerves of many investors and get the markets moving again. The UK government issued statistics showing the recession had ended in late 2009 but this was only made possible by temporary government measures.
Some of these measures include firms restocking, the car scraping scheme that the government introduced, and increased spending before the VAT increase at the beginning of the year.
Its expected that the positive side effects of these measures will wear off soon which could slow growth significantly in the short term.
At the same time as this report, Begbies Traynor issued more data saying that insolvencies were down in the final quarter of 2009 – as much as 15% lower than a year before. Begbies Traynor felt this could be another side effect of government measures after the recession.
One thing Ernst & Young suggested was that the government could lower interest rates even though further unemployment was expected.
Looking to find out more about the consumer spending and the IVA process, then visit Mike Garrett’s site on debt in the UK.