While in Europe we await the start of the vaccination campaign against Covid-19, which could represent the beginning of the exit from the pandemic tunnel, we are taking stock of a very difficult 2020 for our economy.
According to Euler Hermes, a company of the Allianz group, world leader in credit insurance, the contraction of Italian GDP in the fourth quarter will be equal to -3%, with an overall decline of -9% in 2020.
It is no better for the Eurozone economy, with an estimate of -4% for the last quarter of the year and -7.6% for the full year.
Data that also takes into account the lockdown 2.0 or "light" implemented in November which, for Euler Hermes, will inflict economic damage on the Eurozone economies by 30-60% less than the March-April lockdown.
"Normality will return in 2022, but pre-crisis levels will only be recovered in 2023", warns Luca Burrafato, head of the Mediterranean Countries, Middle East and Africa (MMEA) region of Euler Hermes.
"It is essential - he stresses - the synchronism between the moment in which the pandemic will come out, the economic support measures will be relaxed, and the recovery of the companies that will have to make the best use of the resources that have been allocated".
A recovery that, as regards Italy in 2021, Euler Hermes quantifies in a more modest + 3.8% compared to the + 4.1% previously estimated.
For the start of the new year, the Allianz group company expects a moderate recovery, mainly due to the lack of strong support from fiscal policy.
According to Euler Hermes, the measures of the National Recovery Plan are mainly supply-oriented and have longer lead times, which are unlikely to allow rapid implementation.
A similar trend also on the European front where in 2021, compared to the + 4.8% expected at the end of September 2020, the Eurozone GDP for Euler Hermes will probably have a more moderate increase, equal to + 4.1%.
The risks that can be seen behind the end of the support measures for businesses should not be overlooked: "The support measures for businesses - explains Burrafato - were very important because they injected a lot of liquidity. But this will ensure that Italian companies, mainly SMEs, therefore undercapitalised, will have to suffer from the fact that they will have much higher debt ".
"The big risk - he underlines - is that there will be an increase in insolvencies which, compared to 2019, will grow by 28% and by 20% compared to 2020".
Recovery that will pass above all from the Recovery Plan and the allocation of the huge resources that will come from the EU, without forgetting the interventions to simplify the bureaucracy, as Burrafato explains: "The simplification of bureaucracy and public administration processes is crucial, because only in this way the economic, productive and corporate system will be able to invest in research and make investments ".
"What has been done so far is very important, but making all the measures enforceable is taking a long time due to bureaucracy. We are convinced that the example of the Genoa bridge is fundamental: when the bureaucracy is demolished an extraordinary work was carried out in a very short time. This crisis must be faced, from our point of view, in the same way ", concludes Burrafato.
In collaboration with:
Euler Hermes