Author:
Jean Bertrand de Lartigue -
Chairman of HR specialist HR2all LTD

Wales is in danger of wasting the hundreds of millions of pounds being spent trying to regenerate the economy because it is overprotective of the public sector and is not focussing sufficiently on the knowledge-based industries that represent the future.

My solution to securing the future prosperity of Wales includes privatising the WDA, ELWA and Wales Tourist Board, rather than bringing it under the umbrella of the Welsh Assembly. I also maintain that Wales should stop trying to prop up low-productivity industries and spend more on developing clusters of knowledge-based industries such as biotechnology and biochemistry.

My views are based on running an international business, which is how Wales needs to position itself if it is to compete on an international stage. "If Wales" job creation and development programme was in the hands of the private sector, it would be far more results driven.

Wales has at its disposal some £ Billions of European funding over the next 2 years. That money should give the country an opportunity to leapfrog other regions in Europe. But it has to be spent cultivating the right industries.

Yes, there are initiatives to promote knowledge-based industries - such as the new Techniums. But Wales should be investing a much higher percentage of available funds on these. Just as an ambitious company would dedicate a fixed percentage of its revenues to R&D, so Wales should be spending a minimum of 4% of its GDP to developing the businesses which represent our future.

I see little point in money being diverted to manufacturing which has low value jobs and where we can often no longer compete internationally. Agriculture too is currently propped up artificially: the only future for farmers is to concentrate on high quality products which attract a premium. I also see little benefit in employing the armies of advisors and business support organisations that the WDA has built up over the last decade or so.

All that money could be spent developing a real future for Wales.

Wales should look at the way countries like Sweden have benefited by moving away from a public-sector mentality.

Sweden privatised 99% of their public services, with a mission to serve the public - not to protect its public servant employment. They reduced the public spending deficit by 12% of GNP between 1992 and 1998 without impacting the quality of public services and - as a direct result - more people ended up in employment than before.

Wales has become over dependent upon grants. It needs to change its culture of subsidies and hand-outs to one prepared to take risks.

At the heart of my vision for the future are the University research departments in Wales which would - with more resources dedicated to them - become the hubs of thriving sector clusters. International inward investment these days is no longer about securing massive new factories . If any country should have learnt its lesson over that, it should be Wales.

Today, global businesses are looking to the Universities which have the exciting R&D programmes that will develop the technologies of tomorrow and then support spin-off businesses, creating high value jobs. Wales has some superb research departments and, with more resources dedicated to them, could pull in investment and employment from all over the world.

Generating these high value jobs will create employment and wealth throughout the rest of the economy.

By tapping into this natural resource and applying all the Objective 1 funds available, rather than just a small part, this country has the opportunity to be home to the next "Silicon Valley" not only in electronics and software but in other sectors such as optoelectronics, biotechnology, sustainable energy and automotive.

If it doesn't seize this opportunity, the hand outs will eventually dry up - and so will the prospects of Wales competing on the world stage.