French, Brazilian ministers slam ‘predatory’ Asia

PARIS – The French and Brazilian industry ministers, both of whom are accused of protectionism by critics, Wednesday lambasted Asia’s ‘predatory’ economic practices.

The comments by France’s Industrial Renewal Minister Arnaud Montebourg, who had tried to nationalise a steel plant owned by Indian tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, and Brazil’s Industry Minister Fernando Pimentel came during a meeting with France’s top employers’ union in Paris.Pimentel said while he was all for free markets, one ‘cannot accept these predatory practices in world trade that we are in the habit of seeing from Asia’.Montebourg said that while France was ‘open to hosting all long-term projects we would just as much protect the European economy from the excesses of a predatory economy, which you have perfectly identified’.British Prime Minister David Cameron had warned Brazil in September against protectionism.’To try to isolate and protect industry from competition can benefit the domestic industry, but this carries long-term costs and prevents the development of a truly competitive and innovative industrial base,’ he said.Brazil has adopted stimulus measures to prop up its struggling domestic industry which has been reeling from declining competitiveness in the face of surging imports, notably from Asia, and the appreciating national currency.Montebourg meanwhile has spearheaded a ‘Made in France’ campaign to kickstart the flagging economy and improve the poor competitiveness of French businesses, well below the European average.He has even gone as far as posing in a Breton sailor top with a Moulinex kitchen blender for a leading French magazine to promote locally-made goods. – Nampa-AFP