The Government of Salvador Illa wants Catalonia to once again lead the Spanish economy and become a leading region throughout Europe with a model of shared prosperity. With this objective, the Government will invest a total of 18,500 million euros until 2030. Illa has remarked that this is the "most ambitious" mobilization of public resources made by the Generalitat since 2010, when the economic crisis had already erupted, a paralysis that would be followed by cuts and the independence process.
"I propose to unleash all the dynamism of Catalan society and break the bottlenecks, untie knots, to be the most prosperous region in Spain and one of the most prosperous in Europe," he defended. During the speech, Illa explained that in his visits to other parts of Spain he has detected "an attitude sometimes of suspicion and certain distrust" towards Catalonia. "That's why it's important to explain myself as president," he defended. "There is a need to explain ourselves and also to listen, and here I see a lot of work to do," he said.
In a conference titled Catalonia leads. An economic model of shared prosperity, the president of the Generalitat has presented a plan consisting of 200 concrete actions. The planned budget will be divided into 13,700 million euros of direct investment from the Generalitat and 4,800 million euros through credits that will be allocated to infrastructure, productive modernization, knowledge and innovation, good governance and equal opportunities. The document states that, to recover Catalonia's economic leadership at the state and European level, a modern economy must be developed that focuses on high value-added sectors and cites agri-food, automotive, transport, chemistry and, without forgetting one of his main concerns after his time at the Ministry of Health during the pandemic, also health and biomedicine as priorities.
The plan presented by Illa states that the improvement of regional financing will become an "essential traction lever" and emphasizes the need to improve productivity. This involves increasing industrial weight and promoting advanced services, especially professional, technological, and financial ones. On the other hand, it urges industry to address the energy and digital transition to modernize the productive structure. In fact, another of the challenges cited is the promotion of the decarbonization of the economy and increasing resilience to climate change. In this regard, the Government recalls that in Catalonia there is low participation in the field of renewable energies in final consumption, with 10% in 2022. These figures are far from the levels of the rest of Spain (22%) and the EU-27 (23%).
Along with improving productivity and decarbonizing the economy, the Catalan executive highlights the need to increase the business size of companies and strengthen them in international markets. It points out that the ratio of companies per 1,000 inhabitants in Catalonia is 36 ---higher than the Spanish and European average--- and that it concentrates 19.5% of salaried employees in all of Spain. Despite this concentration, companies are smaller than those in surrounding economies.
Salvador Illa: "Access to housing is a country's horizon, we must join efforts and we will not leave anyone behind"Illa also referred to the return of company headquarters to Catalonia, as recently done by the Banco Sabadelland the cement companyMolins---their presidents, Josep Oliu and Joan Molins, respectively, were among the attendees---. "I don't ask for it and I haven't asked for it, but I sincerely appreciate it," he asserted.At the conference, business representatives also attended, such as the new president of Telefónica, Marc Murtra; the chairman of the board of directors of Enagás, Antoni Llardén; the president of Foment del Treball, Josep Sánchez Llibre; the CEO of Criteria, Ángel Simon; the president and CEO of Aena, Maurici Lucena; or the former president of the Cercle d'Economia, Javier Faus.
In his speech, Illa focused on access to housing, recalling the Government's plan to build 50,000 public housing units by 2030. "I see how it has become, not only in Catalonia, but also in Catalonia, one of the main factors of inequality as its price has increased far above the disposable income of citizens," he indicated. "We have a reminder very close to here today," he added, referring to the eviction planned at Casa Orsola, postponed until next week due to the massive presence of protesters this Friday outside its doors. "Access to housing is a country's horizon, we have to join forces and we will not leave anyone behind," he concluded.
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