«The NRP, agreed with the European partners, is essentially fine. It must be implemented, implemented, implemented. Individual projects can be re-discussed, not the whole plan. The risk is to block everything ». The Minister of Economy, Daniele Franco, speaks across the board, but it is on the National Recovery and Resilience Plan that he spends the clearest words. The PNRR «was born as a tool to affect investments, productivity and employment» he said at the Workshop “The scenario of economy and finance” organized by The European House – Ambrosetti, in a round table moderated by the director of Sole 24 Ore, Fabio Tamburini.
Franco: you can fix the PNRR, but not completely undo it
So – for the minister – “the NRP is fundamental but not sufficient at the moment we have. I do not think that the events of the last few months call into question these medium-term objectives that we must have – investments, productivity and employment – but rather call into question economic policies in the short term. But not our mid-term goal. So if the NRR is consistent with this objective, it can be adjusted, discussed on individual projects, but it is not worthwhile to undo it in its entirety and then start over. It must be strengthened for climate efficiency and for greater national autonomy ».
The priorities of economic policy in the short term
For economic policy in the short term «the need is to mitigate the impact of the increase in energy prices on households and businesses, we must protect competitiveness. We have intervened several times for the cost of energy and I believe that these interventions on the business side will be continued and other possible interventions “, announced the minister, who recalled how up to now 19 billion have been allocated, of which 14 will cover the first two quarters of 2022. «The trend in gas prices sees the current one two and a half times that of last August. Until February we thought this was slowing but not stopping our recovery. In the short term, the impact of energy prices on households and businesses must be mitigated. Competitiveness must be protected ».
Dear energy, focus on the diversification of gas supplies
Therefore «we need to work on the diversification of gas supplies. There are technical times but the goal is to reduce Italian dependence by enhancing renewable production. The national plan goes in this direction, we probably need to run more ». If in the medium term the prospect is the NRP, in the short term we must look at “support for business families, interventions on diversification and reduction of supply, in particular on gas”.
Towards the Def
In the next few days the Draghi government will launch the Def, a document with the new forecasts on the economy: «We will come out as a government in the Economics and Finance Document with a cautious forecast on GDP, because there is great uncertainty. Like last year, it is better to be proven wrong for being pessimistic rather than too optimistic “, he added:” Every forecast made now we must know that in the short term it will have to be adapted. In fact, we do not know when the war will end and what energy prices will be like in a year ”. Not only that: «The harmful effects of the pandemic have been greatly reduced, but they have not disappeared. Air traffic is now 50% of what it was in 2019. Some effects of the pandemic continue to persist. “