The Cernobbio Forum, promoted by The European House-Ambrosetti from 6 to 8 September at Villa d'Este on Lake Como, will, as always, be the rendezvous for the economy and finance elite who, together with the top government officials and many of the world's leading economists, will in fact open the new season of economics and politics. As Valerio De Molli, CEO of The European House-Ambrosetti explains in this interview with FIRSTonline, the Forum will be more than ever an opportunity to take the pulse of the establishment in the wake of one of the craziest government crises to come have ever been seen in Italy. What do entrepreneurs and bankers want and what will they ask of the Government and what are the most up-to-date forecasts of the major economists on the future of the Italian and world economy? We will know in Cernobbio.
Doctor De Molli, The European House – Ambrosetti Forum reaches its 45th edition. After almost half a century of life, will this year's appointment re-propose traditional standards or will there be significant innovations from an organizational and guest point of view?
“As per tradition, the Cernobbio Forum presents itself with very high organizational and content standards but with increasingly international contents and protagonists. Since I, with some other partners, liquidated the founder over ten years ago, the international dimension and the development of proprietary content has been growing. To the point that for 6 consecutive years The European House - Ambrosetti has obtained the prestigious recognition from the University of Pennsylvania, which places us in the "Best Private Think Tanks" category as the first think tank in Italy, among the top 10 in Europe and among the top 100 independent out of 8.100 globally. The guests, as happens every year, are carefully selected to ensure a very high quality of the sessions in line with the most important issues that the world, Europe and Italy are facing, to provide participants with the main company of the best Italian and international companies, the answers to the hottest issues they will have to face in the coming months".
As often happens, The European House – Ambrosetti Forum takes place in a particularly hot moment of political and economic current affairs, amidst the government crisis, tariffs, Brexit, the Argentina case and market tensions. Looking from the point of view of those who are about to host a great event, what is the wind like in Italy and in the world?
“There is no doubt that there is a lot of uncertainty and this constitutes the worst obstacle to economic growth and entrepreneurial development. In Italy, the political situation is not far from what we have been used to for many years; it is not and should not be normal, mind you, but by now I think that the Italian entrepreneurial class has gotten used to working and making decisions even without political stability. The mantra of The European House – Ambrosetti is: without investment there is no work, without work there is no growth, without growth there is no future. It is clear that in conditions of uncertainty, companies tend to delay and postpone investment decisions, with a consequent stagnation of the economic and employment indicators that we all know".
Given the government crisis and the new executive that is approaching, how are you orienting yourself on the invitations of the political exponents?
“Like every year, government officials are invited. The Cernobbio Forum stands out for being a moment of absolute openness and debate between the different political forces. It will be again this year but, as per tradition, I can't anticipate anything. There will be 10 foreign governments, many European commissioners and the main Italian politicians”.
Without going into the merits of political preferences: would it have been better for Italy to go to the vote immediately or is it better to have a new government to secure the maneuver and avoid the VAT increase?
“What is important for Italy is the credibility it transmits abroad and on the markets because this is transferred to the real economy. We have a political government and a Parliament which is an expression of democracy and it is right that it is a political government, whether aimed at bringing the country to the polls or not, to take on the political responsibility of approving the extraordinary financial maneuver and preventing the increase in the VAT. No less than 25 billion are needed to avert the VAT increase”.
What should be the priorities of the new government? If you were in Parliament, where would you start from?
“Domestic consumption has been at a standstill for years and every maneuver that manages to bring out more income for families, combined with more confidence, goes in the right direction. If I were in Parliament I would start from two urgencies. First: the reform of the electoral law and the resolution of the Italian bicameral system. It would be enough to copy the French model with the double shift: whoever wins governs and takes all honor and consequent burden. If you do well, the citizens reward you with the renewal of trust. If not, the citizens send you home. Our system, on the other hand, is set up to guarantee perfect ungovernability. You can form a government only through the art of negotiation and compromise. This is a downwards game that brings out the "worst" of all policies. Second thing to do: the simplification of the state machinery, from the reduction of the number of laws, often redundant and hindering private initiative and the realization of works necessary for the country, to the reform of the judiciary and the Public Administration, to make it a help to citizens and businesses and not an obstacle, as it often is today. This will be developed in proprietary research which, as the Ambrosetti Club, we will present on Sunday morning, 8 September, in the usual Agenda for Italy”.
Unfortunately, a few weeks ago, an economist of the caliber of Fabrizio Saccomanni, a regular guest at The European House – Ambrosetti Forum, passed away. What would you like to say in remembrance of him?
“It is a loss that saddens us greatly. First of all, a friend suddenly passed away. A well-prepared, competent and highly experienced person who served the State humbly and with passion has passed away. I recall his speech at the Forum, which took place in 2013 as Minister of Economy and Finance, during which he expounded the need for economic recovery policies to relaunch the country, but that these should be based on firm control of public finances. I think this message of yours is still relevant, even if to pursue this double objective a great political will is needed which is often lacking in our politicians, always oriented towards increasing the base of consensus, because, necessarily, it can lead to a reduction in consensus. I think, however, that it is also the only possible way to bring the country back to growth”.
From a strictly content point of view, which edition of The European House – Ambrosetti will be next? Precisely, what will be discussed in the various panels scheduled?
“As per tradition, the program of the “Three Days of Cernobbio” is not made public in advance, so I cannot reveal the details of the sessions. As I anticipated, we will talk about the world, Europe and Italy, addressing the hot topics that have been the protagonists of these months. We will also talk about sustainability, current economic challenges and future prospects, technology and optimism. Within these themes there will be space for proprietary research that we present to the world every year and the Peres Heritage Initiative which, with the endorsement of the Peres family and the government of Israel, has been rewarding the three best under-35s who have stand out to make the world a better place. Among the researches that we will present, I anticipate the themes of two of these:
- "Just E-volution 2030. The socio-economic impacts of the energy transition" created for Enel and the Enel Foundation, in which The European House - Ambrosetti has developed an innovative econometric model to estimate the impacts of the energy transition, enabled by the electrification, on industrial production and employment in the European Union and in Italy, Spain and Romania;
- “Investing in regional rail transport. An opportunity for the Italian regions and for the country” created for Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, in which the contribution in terms of economic, environmental and social sustainability that can be activated starting from investments in regional rail transport is quantified”.
Also at a financial level, one of the paradigms of this era is the environment: renewable sources, green investments, international agreements to reduce emissions. What is your commitment on this front? Have you ever thought, for example, of inviting Greta Tunberg to Cernobbio?
“In our small way, like The European House – Ambrosetti, also thanks to the initiative of our consultants, we have activated various internal actions to reduce the environmental impact. Sustainability, and I want to give the term the widest possible sense of what it represents (environmental, social and economic sustainability), is objectively the future because the available resources are limited; many steps forward have been made, there are still many to be made, but I am optimistic because the path taken is the right one and I am convinced that in the future man will be increasingly attentive to sustainability issues. On Greta Tunberg we decided not to invite her. We prefer to deal with and discuss concrete problems and launch precise proposals, rather than participate in the media and marketing phenomenon. This is the area for less talk and more substance. It would have been much easier for us to participate in the media circus of "gretism", but we preferred to avoid it. Also because she probably would have been engaged in a sailing boat with Casiraghi in the ocean ”.
One of the evils of this historical era is disinformation and fake news. The European House – Ambrosetti forum is an appointment of undoubted authority, but what is your commitment to spreading knowledge beyond the walls of Villa d'Este and making it reach everyone, to combat the rampant functional illiteracy, above all in Italy?
"The commitment and mission of the Cernobbio Forum has been, for 45 years to today, to provide the Italian and international ruling class with all the tools and information necessary and useful for making the correct decisions to face the future in the best possible way . In Cernobbio we do it by creating discussions of the highest level by inviting speakers with a solid foundation of knowledge and internationally recognizable. Unfortunately, the distinction between what is fake news and what is not can only be made by the reader, by reading the news in depth and documenting himself in an equally in-depth way. Finally, I think that the State has a role in stemming this deleterious and dangerous phenomenon for the democratic and economic stability of a country and this role passes through a decisive investment in education, on which the future of every country is based: not it is possible that Italy is in the penultimate place in Europe for the percentage of graduates (only Romania is behind us); it is obvious that a more educated reader is better able to discern what is true from what, on the contrary, is only fiction, often studied on purpose to induce a controlled reaction”.
