of the prominent industrial areas in japan – with electrical machinery and the automobile industry, in addition to the steel industry – as well as a base for international trade with asian and other countries. other than on the industrial front, kitakyushu city has become one of the world ’ s environmental cities, and recently was selected as a “ model city for green growth ” by the organisation for economic co - operation and development ( oecd ), and as a “ future city ” by the japanese government. in addition, the government has decided to recommend “ local industrial heritage sites of the meiji period ”, which include yahata steelworks - related facilities in kitakyushu, to the united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization bis central bankers ’ speeches ( unesco ) as candidates for world heritage sites this fiscal year. this region has started to grab the spotlight in industrial tourism. as global competition intensifies in the years ahead, the path kitakyushu follows might not be a smooth one. however, this region has a strong industrial base, including manufacturing technology and human resources, which has been established over many years. this region also has well - developed traffic and distribution systems, with a 24 - hour airport and the starting point of the east kyushu highway that extends to miyazaki city scheduled to be opened in fiscal 2014. while fully utilizing those strengths, i strongly believe that kitakyushu ’ s economy will further grow and develop into the future. thank you. bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches bis central bankers ’ speeches

this recession or this slowdown ( however you call it ) has not been as costly in terms of employment ( at least not yet ) as in previous recessions. and because of this, there has not been a sharp decline in emigrants remittances as was previously expected. ( these remittances are an important source of domestic demand and foreign exchange earnings for many caribbean countries. i think in jamaica remittances are the major source of foreign exchange earnings ). ( so this is the global re - balancing effect. ) • a second factor that has contributed to the insulation of the region from greater contagion has been the improved strength of the regional financial sector. it is now certain that banks in the region have not been directly affected by the subprime crisis, because they have not held any of these assets and because their lending operations have been based on the growth of deposits rather than on borrowing from foreign banks. ( the credit crunch partly resulted from the fact that banks were no longer willing to lend to each other because they were worried about the extent of possible losses from us sub - prime mortgage backed securities. ( this has not been an issue in the region. ) more fundamentally however, since the jamaican financial crisis of the late 1990 ’ s, the regional banking system has gone through a period of consolidation and strengthening, reflected in the increase in capital and a sharp reduction in nonperforming loans ( chart 9 ). this meant that banks were in a position to continue lending and supporting domestic activity even in an environment of tight global liquidity ( chart 10 ). • another important financial plus for the region is this. previously, when global liquidity dried up, caribbean countries were shut off from international funding and this impacted productive investment and sometimes forced cutbacks in government expenditure. what has changed is that, now the regional governments as well as regional corporations that have been shut out of the global markets have turned to the trinidad and tobago capital market for financing and in that way, have been able to maintain investment spending ( chart 11 ). • a third factor that explains the better resilience of the regional economies is the fact ( perhaps not sufficiently recognized ) that macro - economic management has improved markedly in regional economies over the last several years. this is reflected in some of the main economic parameters. fiscal deficits have been reduced ; public debt has declined ; and net international reserves have risen sharply. all these factors have increased the resilience of regional economies. (