samchain/econo-pairs-v1 huggingface dataset:
In addition to this growth limitation, there is a capacity limitation too affecting the growth in the agricultural sector. Two main inputs used in agriculture, viz., cultivable land and water, are in short supply inhibiting an effective limitation on its growth. Further, agriculture in  7  Ibid, p 56. 8  For instance, in Sri Lanka, slightly more than a half of the national income is earned by people living in three main districts that make up the more lucrative Western Province. See, Economic and Social Statistics of Sri Lanka 2007 Table 41. 9  For instance, Ten-yea Horizon Development Framework 2006-16 has enunciated the vision, inter alia, of transforming traditional subsistence agriculture to a commercially oriented and productive sector. See, Annual Report of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, 2006, p 17. 10  Lanka Business Online, provider of an internet based business and economic analyses, has reported results of a survey on the job preferences of the youth in two remote villages off Anuradhapura where none of the youth have selected agriculture as their future job preference. Visit www.lbo.com. 11  World Bank, Global Economic Prospects 2007, pp 81-3. 12  Sri Lanka’s case in this context is more disappointing with only an annual average growth rate of 1.1% during 1990-2005. See, World Development Report 2007. BIS Review 22/2008  3  certain areas such as the Western Province has now become commercially unviable on account of ever falling yield levels and rising costs of production 13 .

So, clusters numbering about 8 to 10 groups were set up by making informal arrangements for them to work together. Separate cluster rules were prepared and the members were trained in keeping cluster accounts and records. This process went on continuously for about 12 to 18 months from the beginning of1999. When the newly formed clusters showed sufficient maturity of being able to operate independently, the next move for the project was planned by the project. In the second stage, it was necessary to give legal status to the clusters. Many options like registering them under the law relating to cooperatives or under the Companies Act were considered, but finally, decision was made to incorporate the clusters under the Societies Ordinance as limited liability societies under the name “Isuru Development Society Ltd”, for the simplicity it provided to the beneficiaries. The societies were registered with the Registrar of Companies in terms of the Ordinance. The societies so registered had the objective of realising a common goal of attaining economic well-being of the members with a mutual  8  BIS Review 22/2008  support. The incorporation of societies as limited liability societies was completed within two years by 2001. The next phase was to further consolidate the limited liability societies into still larger economic organisations. Such a consolidation was essential in order to permit this larger organisation to effectively function as a strong economic entity. This goal was attained by consolidating the common efforts of societies in a particular district into a district-wide limited liability company.
But they entail several risks, and they could lead to significant concentration effects among a few dominant private networks: these would in practice “re-intermediate”, but without the trust and regulation associated with the architecture of the monetary and financial edifice that we – public and private players – have built together over a period of decades. In the face of this major challenge, we need to both innovate and regulate. For some, the conjunction between the two should be an “or”, considering them mutually exclusive: innovation in the form of a central bank digital currency would be an alternative, indeed the only alternative, to the unchecked development of decentralised finance. For me, the conjunction is “and”: the two pillars clearly work together to foster sustainable innovation; this is why the EU should at once (i) adopt the MiCA regulation on crypto assets in the first half of this year, (ii) prepare for a Central Bank Digital Currency, a e-euro, by 2026. But the worst conjunction would be “neither, nor”: revolutions always happen quickly, and we are at risk of neither innovating nor regulating in time. In that case we would have failed in our historical mission and jeopardised centuries of work building up confidence in our money. Page 8 sur 9 2/ Let me now turn to the second major transformation underway, the ecological transition, which is an absolute necessity at the global level even if Europe here lies ahead. Climate change is accelerating.

It is also a popular success; it inspires trust which is the core value of a currency. The latest standard Eurobarometer poll conducted in spring 2021 reported that 79% of the population in the 19 countries using the euro believe that having the currency is good for the EU. That’s up from 66 percent a decade ago. Even wellknown nationalist politicians, including in my own country, have dropped or backed-off their anti-euro stances because they have concluded that the policy is an electoral dead-end. Obviously as Governor of the Banque de France and a committed European, I enjoy reading out those numbers. Yet I do not wish to be simplistic or Panglossian. The euro area has had problems over the years, most notably resulting in the sovereign debt crisis in the early 2010s. That crisis was a  Page 4 sur 9 reminder that by forging a currency union before a political union existed, we were doing something unprecedented. Yet European political leaders have ultimately proved themselves to be pragmatic, backing the European Central Bank in its defence of the euro. Lessons were learned and when the Covid crisis hit in 2020, the EU gave the region’s economy appropriate fiscal support. The combined stimulus provided by the EU and national governments was comparable to that of the U.S. and the U.K. Meanwhile the ECB did its part in supplying monetary stimulus also on par with that of other developed countries.
As for the PSPP, Greek government bonds lost their eligibility on 21 August when the programme ended. At that point, the Eurogroup’s debt measures had still not been ratified. In any case, purchases would have been very limited over such a short period. Is there any chance that Greek bonds could be included at some point in the future in the reinvestment phase of the PSPP? How many years do you think the reinvestment of maturing securities will last? Without a programme, Greek government bonds are now treated like any other bonds for the purpose of ECB eligibility. Once they regain investment grade status they could be included in all ECB programmes, subject to a Governing Council decision. As you know, we intend to reinvest the principal payments from maturing securities purchased under the asset purchase programme (APP) for an extended period of time after the end of our net asset purchases, and in any case for as long as necessary to maintain favourable liquidity conditions and an ample degree of monetary accommodation. The government seems to have put on hold, for the time being, plans to return to the markets. Do you think that Greece has now regained full access to international capital markets? Do you think it should wait until after the elections to go back to the markets? Greece’s market access conditions have clearly improved compared with one year ago.

For example, it will be easier to reduce the amount of NPLs if there is a reduction in the backlog of cases related to the household insolvency framework (the so-called Katseli law) that are still pending before the courts. In June the government presented an ambitious action plan that will be closely monitored in the context of the enhanced surveillance framework. Are you satisfied with the pace of e-auctions? A comprehensive approach involving all stakeholders must remain in place at all times to ensure that the e-auction system continues to be successful. We have seen a clear improvement here in recent months, but further progress in raising the number of auctions is needed, especially for properties located outside Attica. So we will continue to monitor the situation closely, in cooperation with the authorities. It is also important to recognise that e-auctions have incentivised borrowers (including strategic defaulters) and banks to work towards a mutually beneficial solution. There are indications of increased restructurings and settlements of loans now that eauctions have started. The ECB lifted the waiver for Greek government bonds. Wasn’t the enhanced surveillance sufficient to keep it? How much liquidity did banks have to get from ELA as a result of lifting the waiver? The minimum credit rating rule for ECB collateral eligibility pre-dates the Greek crisis. In 2010, we acknowledged that the rule could be procyclical and granted a waiver to countries under an EU/IMF programme, because policy conditionality and access to comprehensive information gave us confidence about the sovereign’s creditworthiness.
As we discussed at our briefing last October, part of reason for the more moderate decline in jobs in New York during the recession was a less pronounced boom-bust housing cycle. Indeed, as a percentage, the city and state lost fewer jobs during this recession than they did during either of the last two downturns. By contrast, the downturn in employment in New Jersey in the current cycle was more severe. About 250,000 jobs were lost, or roughly 6.0 percent of total state employment – about the same as in the country as a whole. This decline is comparable to the job losses during the most severe recent recession in the state, that of 1989–1992. Fairfield County in Connecticut, also part of our District, saw declines comparable to the nation, while Puerto Rico experienced much deeper and longer job declines than the nation. In fact, employment in Puerto Rico began declining nearly two years before the onset of the recession on the mainland. Now, as in the nation, a labor market recovery has begun across much of the region. Over the past year, the tri-state region added roughly 100,000 private-sector jobs. Within the region, however, the recovery has been somewhat uneven. New York City, upstate New York and Fairfield County have been gaining jobs for more than a year now – at roughly the same pace as the nation. However, employment in New Jersey has only begun to expand during the past few months. In Puerto Rico, job growth has yet to be firmly established.

However, there are some signs that the economy has stabilized in recent months. Regional employment trends Now, let me turn specifically to employment trends in the region, the focus of our briefing today. In particular, we want to describe our region’s experience during the recession and recovery. Nationally, the Great Recession, which began in December 2007, has been the deepest economic downturn since World War II. At the jobs trough in February 2010 – about 7 months after the official end of the recession – the country had lost almost 6.5 percent of its jobs and the unemployment rate had more than doubled. Many people lost their jobs or saw their hours or income cut, and the duration of unemployment for jobless workers reached a historical high. For many families, this distress was compounded by losses of wealth from declining home prices and stock market losses. Since the jobs trough, unemployment has retreated by a percentage point and jobs growth has resumed, albeit at a slow pace. Today, we will review questions about jobs in our region such as: How severe was the downturn? Where are jobs returning? And, what factors affect the employment outlook? As in other parts of the country, employment in our region declined substantially during the recession. But, New York and New Jersey and Puerto Rico had very different experiences. Employment in much of New York State, including New York City, declined less severely than the nation. Both the state and city lost about 3.8 percent of their jobs.
However, we assume that households will choose to spread consumption over time, so that the saving ratio will continue to fall in spite of an increase in interest rates. Housing construction activity is still high. In January and February, housing starts were 17.5 per cent higher than in the same period last year. Growth in housing investment is expected to ease through 2005. However, the projection for housing starts is also very high for 2005. Such a high level of housing starts over several years probably means that more dwellings will be constructed than implied by underlying demand. As a result, housing investment is expected to decline after a period. Higher interest rates and weaker developments in the Norwegian economy may also lead to a fall in residential construction after a period. The rise in house prices has moderated, and prices in March were 8.2 per cent higher than in the same month last year. The upturn in mainland fixed investment is broadly based. Stronger profitability, higher capacity utilisation and solid export growth will contribute to continued investment growth in goods-producing industries. Demand for services is expected to continue to grow for a period ahead with an attendant increase in investment in service sectors. When growth in the economy gradually slows, investment growth will probably slacken. Mainland exports of goods and services will also benefit from solid global growth this year. Later in the period, a continued loss of market shares as a result of high cost levels will dampen export growth.

The fall in prices for imported consumer goods was unexpectedly sharp. It is uncertain whether this price fall was due to abnormal seasonal patterns or a decline in underlying inflation. The fall in prices may be related to an unusually warm winter, which has made it more difficult to sell winter clothing and sports equipment at ordinary prices. On the other hand, there are indications that prices for imported consumer goods in foreign currency may have fallen somewhat more than previously assumed. The wide variations in prices for some imported consumer goods, especially clothing and footwear, may lead to wide monthly variations in consumer price figures. Excluding changes in prices for clothing and footwear, the year-on-year rise in the CPI-ATE in March was 1.2 per cent, down from 1.3 per cent in February. Changes in indirect taxes, and particularly in VAT rates, have made it more difficult to interpret the price figures for the beginning of the year. The low level of inflation may be partly due to a lag in price adjustments following the indirect tax changes. Among the companies in our regional network, the share expecting a sharper rise in selling prices in the coming year is larger than the share expecting a slower rise in prices. TNS Gallup’s business sentiment survey conveys a more neutral impression. Nevertheless, both surveys indicate expectations of a sharper rise in prices in the service sector. The other Nordic countries have also experienced falling inflation.
Depending on what had happened to sterling’s bilateral exchange rates, the UK would not be immune from spillovers, as the euro area is by far our largest trading partner. For some time, therefore, global imbalances have been a real source of risk to the UK as well as to the global economy. Should I have been voting to cut interest rates to head off those risks? I don’t think so. It would not have made sense to try to anticipate the effects of a shock that had not yet occurred and over which we had effectively no influence. A number of external ‘tail risks’ are rather like that. How does that fit with ‘precautionary’ or ‘insurance’ policy settings. Individual policymakers differ on the usefulness of this concept. I find it quite useful. But on my view of what it means, it has to be subject to some quite stringent conditions in practice. Remembering that we have a highly imperfect line of sight of what is going on in the economy, assume as a thought experiment that some indicators are flashing the possibility that there has been a material shock to demand. For example, imagine that there has been a bit of bad news but that there  15  Harrison et al, 2005, ‘The Bank of England Quarterly Model’, pages 128-132. BIS Review 46/2006  5  are signs that consumer confidence may be ebbing away by more than we would have guessed was proportionate. So maybe spending will fall materially.

The volatility of key variables for economic agents such as the interest rate, inflation or the exchange rate has diminished. But growth has continued to be unbalanced in those aspects I have already mentioned, such as household and corporate debt, and continuing price and cost differentials. At issue here are imbalances posing risks to growth sustainability within an area with very high stability requirements by Spanish standards. Yet while such risks are very important for the Spanish economy, the biggest risk of all is complacency. It is vital to maintain the attitude of non-complacency which has driven economic agents, governments and other players who have sustained the Spanish dynamism of recent decades. A change in attitude which were to convert the satisfaction with the current situation into an excuse to detain the drive to innovate and reform would, sooner or later, bring the ongoing process to a halt. We must continue striving to discover how we can improve the performance of our institutions and companies. This is the main idea I wish to share with you today: let us not fall into complacency. However much we have progressed, let us not stop. There are examples of developed countries which, having achieved very favourable income and wealth levels, lost their reforming dynamism and, as a result, entered lasting situations of slackness and sluggishness with serious employment problems and a deterioration in confidence at all levels. It is therefore important to identify the specific policies we should foster in the future.
But openness is not only a requirement in itself but also a necessary condition for monetary policy to work. It does not work unless the Riksbank and the objective of our activities are supported and legitimated by the people. And this requires that we are open and clear. It should be easy to critically examine how monetary policy is conducted and how well we live up to our principles. Most people probably agree that the Riksbank’s openness has contributed to a good monetary policy debate in recent years. Openness and clarity contribute to monetary policy functioning better But it is not only democratic reasons that have led to the Riksbank and most other central banks becoming more open and clear. Another important reason is that we have quite simply regarded it as a means of more easily achieving our objective and of making monetary policy more efficient. There are three main aspects I would like to emphasise in this context: •  Firstly, it will be easier to communicate that the interest rate decisions made are really aimed at achieving low and stable inflation. This provides greater credibility and helps to anchor expectations around the target. It was an important reason why the Riksbank began to publish its inflation forecasts and other material on which decisions are based early on in the new inflation-targeting system.

Particularly over the past two years we have made a number of changes and this has led to some debate. This often happens in times of change, particularly if it requires a learning process – for all those involved – before everything falls into place. And this is also the case with the changes in the Riksbank’s communication. It is therefore quite natural that some questions have arisen: Why has the Riksbank made these changes? Haven’t you made things unnecessarily complicated – tried to “fix something that isn’t broken”? Have you even gone too far in your openness? These are important questions that I shall try to answer here tonight. Giving the right information at the right time and in the right way is particularly important in times of unease. There has recently been unrest in the financial markets around the world. Sweden has not been affected by the market turbulence to the same extent as several other countries. I would nevertheless like to take the opportunity to say a few words about our views on what is happening right now and on the Riksbank's role in this context. But before I do so, I would first like to discuss the changes in our method of communication made over the past two years and the reasons behind them. What are the reasons behind the increased openness and clarity? Many consider that the Riksbank is currently one of the world’s most open central banks.
The country’s exports to major markets experienced double-digit growth, surpassing RM1 trillion in value in the first half of 20211. This has buffered us during the downtime for domestic activity, of which now with the re-opening of the economy we could expect a better recovery into the fourth quarter this year. Enormous opportunities therefore, lie for Islamic trade finance to support global trade and the post-pandemic recovery. Globally, Islamic trade finance has reached USD186 billion in size and is growing both in scale and in demand as Islamic finance plays a more significant role in OIC countries. In mitigating the impact of the pandemic and sustaining trade supply chains, the Islamic Trade Finance Corporation has also provided support, approving USD4.7 billion of trade financing in 2020, to benefit member countries. So what would the report tell us of how Islamic finance in Malaysia has fared in being a part of this. We would think that the strong trends we have seen should be accompanied by greater trade facilitation by the financial sector as we know that about 47 percent of global trade is estimated to be supported by bank-intermediated trade finance2. But we also know that in the past, Islamic trade finance share in Malaysia has been relatively low, and we measured this at 11.3% of trade financed in 2016.

But the official sector could possibly mitigate their cost by establishing a coherent framework for crisis management, with payment suspensions as one of the tools. None of this is at all to suggest that the issue of standstills - in or outside the Bank of England - is fully articulated and concluded. It is a difficult area requiring contributions from all sides and the  BIS Review 70/2000  8  intellectual argument is ongoing. Finding the right balance between rules and discretion, in this area as in so many, remains a key issue for policymakers. There is work to be done on the modalities of how standstills might operate in different crisis cases. What is the role of the IMF in the standstill process? Does the process need to be underpinned by statute or would non-statutory principles suffice? And when might a standstill require capital controls to guard against leakage? The Bank is currently working on some of these issues, practical and conceptual. I would encourage those among you with an interest in international public policy to help us in addressing them, joining the growing number of, in particular, US academics who are exploring this topic. It is very much a live debate and I have no doubt these issue will be discussed at length, at and around the World Bank and IMF Annual Meetings in Prague later this month. Conclusion I have now talked myself - quite literally - to a standstill.