| News May 2010 US Back on the Agenda! Module |  |  |  | |
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| | The US Back on the agenda! - a new normal?
Summary of our Business Conference 2010
By Linda Westerlund, Intern, Danish-American Business Forum
The word ”change” has been on everyone’s lips since last years presidential election and 2010 has been no exception. Especially taking the economic crisis into consideration there has been plenty of challenges for the US market in the past 12 months. Due to the strain caused by the crisis, there has been a continuous tendency to shift focus towards the East and away from the US market as a recipient of European exports. Despite the gloomy predictions, the message seems to be that the US is back on the agenda and that the US is still a key market for Europe despite the recession. This exact message was the focus of this year’s business conference with the theme “The US Back on the Agenda”. True to tradition, the Business Conference was a continuation of our Annual General Meeting held on April 21.
Supplying the opening remarks was US ambassador to Denmark Laurie S. Fulton and also here the focal point was the recession and the subsequent government initiatives, fronted by President Obama, to ensure a healthy US economy in the future. Among others was mentioned the US national export program which has the mission of increasing US exports over the next 12 months. The ambassador’s response to the headline “the US back on the agenda” was “I didn’t realise we were ever off the agenda”.
Picking up on and elaborating on Ambassador Fulton’s input was chief economist at A.P Møller Mærsk, Graham Slack. Crunching the numbers, he concluded that the US economy is stable although we have passed the phenomenal 2008 booms. The optimistic projections were largely carried by the US consumer, who is, as exclaimed by Graham Slack “never to be underestimated”. Although the positive development in the US economy might not be rock steady, it is back on track.
The question remaining is how sustainable the current growth is and just how vulnerable the global economy is to a possible set back. Ultimately, Graham Slack concluded that what the US market is currently experiencing is growth with a risk and that even though the status quo might not be what we consider “normal” we might have to get use to this change and embrace “a new normal”.
Also Director at Phil & Søn and president of Phil Inc. Kjartan Langvad chose to look at the positive prospects for the American economy playing down the challenge of the Chinese market. Contrary to popular projections Kjartan Langvad recognizes no threats to the US position on the market and agrees with US ambassador Laurie S. Fulton and Graham Slack that the US was never “off” the agenda and the status quo might not be what we are use to, but that we need to recognize a “new normal”.
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