MEXICO: Palabras del Presidente y Director Ejecutivo Alstom. PATRICK KRON

PATRICK KRON. Ser la cabeza a nivel mundial de una institución con presencia en 70 países es todo un reto, aunque él lo afronta con agudeza gracias al orgullo de sentirse parte de una empresa que contribuye al desarrollo de la humanidad:

“Cuando construimos una nueva planta de energía, sistemas de transporte como el metro y sistemas de trenes, no sólo estamos apoyando la economía del lugar, sino también está cambiando la vida de la gente, por lo que es extremadamente enriquecedor para mí y para todos nuestros equipos poder proporcionar algo que está mejorando el futuro de las personas”.

Además de esta satisfacción, se encuentra el hecho de haber conseguido la prosperidad para su empresa en los cuatro años que lleva de pertenecer a ella: “el primer periodo fue de difíciles problemas financieros, por lo que experimentamos una crisis muy profunda con la preocupación de que no pudiéramos recuperarnos y nos desplomáramos, fueron momentos de tensión, de actividades intensas buscando una manera de sobrevivir. Fue muy fructífero y positivo movernos de la situación de peligro donde estábamos a la estrategia de crecimiento en la que nos encontramos ahora.

El año pasado contratamos ocho mil personas, colaboradores de primer nivel entre los cuales tenemos destacadísimos ingenieros y gerentes; estamos creciendo, tenemos una gran reserva”. Comenta con el gusto de saber que ha salido avante; además, esta situación no sólo lo complace en el ámbito profesional, también en el personal debido a que su principal meta se ha convertido en realidad: “ahora estamos sobre una buena vía y una trayectoria positiva, así que la tensión y la frustración se convirtieron en satisfacción y orgullo”.

Y con la misma tónica de optimismo habla de México, país en el que Alstom ha estado presente a lo largo de 40 años en el área de transporte y más de dos décadas en el sector de energía: “los indicadores macroeconómicos son muy buenos, la tasa de crecimiento es sólida, la inflación está bajo control, por lo que me siento optimista respecto al futuro a corto y mediano plazos.

Actualmente vemos en la política energética de México algo que también observamos en la base mundial, que es el deseo no sólo de desarrollar una infraestructura, sino también la forma de diversificación, debido a la necesidad de proteger al país y a sus industrias frente a la evolución de los precio. Veremos un fuerte desarrollo de infraestructura para la generación de energía y éste incluirá un equilibrio de recursos, una fuerte dependencia de petróleo y gas, pero también algunos desarrollos en energía nuclear, hidro y carbón”.

Este escenario energético y de transporte es el que nos comparte alguien que sin duda no sólo es un conocedor, sino un apasionado indiscutible de su trabajo; un hombre francés con gran sentido no sólo universal y empresarial sino social y humano.

Via: El Mundo del Petroleo

Blogalaxia|マヌエル,エレルギ-ボルゴ, Mexico

RUSSIA: The owner of Russneft, one of Russia’s largest private oil companies, confirmed Monday that he would sell the business to an investor loyal

The Oil Magnate owner of Russneft, one of Russia’s largest private oil companies, confirmed Monday that he would sell the business to an investor loyal to the Kremlin, but he added in an open letter that the sale was not voluntary.

Mikhail S. Gutseriev, who was once in the tight coterie of Russian billionaires known as oligarchs but has since fallen from favor, accused the government of President Vladimir V. Putin of forcing him out of the company using trumped-up tax claims.

The critical letter was the first significant public challenge to Mr. Putin from an influential businessman since the imprisonment four years ago of Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, the former chairman of Yukos Oil, who is serving an eight-year sentence in Siberia. The development left analysts wondering what the future holds now for Mr. Gutseriev.

In a letter that was published on his company Web site on Monday but had been removed by Monday evening, Mr. Gutseriev maintained that the government was using regulatory pressure on both foreign and domestic producers as a pretext to expropriate oil and natural gas property privatized in the 1990s, as part of an effort to effectively nationalize the energy industry.

“They made me an offer to leave the oil business, to leave ‘on good terms,’ ” Mr. Gutseriev wrote in the letter, which was also published in Russia’s largest business newspaper, Vedomosti. “I refused.”

“Then, to make me more amenable, they tightened the screws on the company with unprecedented persecution,” he wrote.

Oleg V. Deripaska, one of Russia’s wealthiest businessmen and an ally of Mr. Putin, applied on Friday for regulatory approval to acquire the oil company. In a statement, his holding company, Basic Element, said Russneft would be incorporated into a subsidiary called En+, which also owns Rusal, Russia’s largest aluminum producer.

Mr. Gutseriev said he decided to sell rather than risk his company’s dismantlement and further harassment of his employees. He has denied any wrongdoing in forming Russneft in 2002.

“I am giving control of the holding to an owner, with whose appearance, I am certain, all the problems of Russneft will in time be solved,” Mr. Gutseriev wrote. In an echo of the Yukos case, which began in 2003, the police charged Mr. Gutseriev with illegal business activity in May.

Last autumn, Russian regulators pressured Royal Dutch Shell about environmental infractions in increasingly shrill terms, at one point threatening to sue for each tree cut down on a pipeline project. Shell and two Japanese partners, in response, sold 50 percent plus one share in the Sakhalin II project to the state energy giant Gazprom.

Then, in June, BP’s local joint venture in Russia, TNK-BP, sold a controlling stake in a large natural gas project to Gazprom for a below-market price after being pressed by regulators for developing the field too slowly, a violation of a license technicality.

In both cases, the foreign companies made no public protest or statement pointing out that the nominal claims against their operations in Russia appeared to be pretexts to force a sale, the point that Mr. Gutseriev made Monday.

“As everybody in the world knows, you don’t fight city hall, and in Russia you don’t fight the Kremlin,” Chris Weafer, the chief analyst at Alfa Bank, said in a telephone interview. “When the Kremlin comes calling and says ‘we want to buy your business,’ the only talk is about price and terms.”

A spokesman for Basic Element did not return calls requesting comment on Mr. Gutseriev’s claim that the transaction involving Russneft was not voluntary, something that could prove a stain on Mr. Deripaska’s business reputation as he expands his mining-to-automotive empire outside Russia’s borders.

The board of Russneft issued a statement Monday saying Mr. Gutseriev had resigned as director and would halt other business activity in Russia as well.

Via: The New York Times
by ANDREW E. KRAMER

Blogalaxia|マヌエル,エレルギ-ボルゴ, RUSSIA

AFRICA: Ghana oil discovery

Ghana enters oil age with wary eye on neighbours. Find could bring wealth, but some fear petrodollars may hinder economic recovery

For years the question has puzzled Ghanaians: surely, in a region awash with oil, their country had some black gold of its own? Last month they got their answer. Ghana does have oil, and lots of it.

Tullow Oil, a UK-listed company, announced in June it had found up to 600m barrels of oil in the deep waters off Cape Three Point. If the results are proven - exploration companies believe the estimates may be conservative - Ghana will join the swelling ranks of African oil producers, netting billions of pounds over the next decade or two.

The news was greeted as if heaven-sent. In the capital, the Accra Daily Mail ran the headline: Thank God. Oil at last. Thank God!

Church groups announced a national prayer day to give thanks. In a radio interview, President John Kufuor said petrodollars would turn his country, already regarded as the success story of west Africa, into an "African Tiger".

"With oil as a shot in the arm, we're going to fly," he said.

But as the euphoria dies down, people are debating whether oil is really the economic injection their country needs. After all, the other countries along the Gulf of Guinea that have discovered significant deposits - from Angola to Equatorial Guinea and Congo-Brazzaville - have sunk rather than flown. And Ghanaians need only travel a few hundred miles east to discover why oil is considered a curse in Africa rather than a godsend.

"Nigeria has oil in abundance, yet the local people have nothing," said George Moore, a 29-year-old restaurant worker in Axim, a fishing village near Cape Three Point. "Is that what is going to happen here?"

Others say Ghana's economy, which relies mainly on gold, timber, cocoa and a budding IT sector, is already doing well without the easy money that oil will provide. Since the near collapse of the economy in the 1980s, economic growth in Ghana has averaged about 5%, climbing to 6% in each of the past three years.

Poverty levels have dropped from 52% in 1990 to 29% today, according to the World Bank, making Ghana one of the few African countries on track for the main Millennium Development Goal of halving poverty by 2015. Compare that to Gabon, which has been pumping hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil a day for more than 30 years and where two-thirds of the population still lives on less than a dollar a day.

"Our country works, but the idea of us producing oil still scares me," said Kofi Bentil, a business lecturer at Ashesi University in Accra. "It will totally change the structure of the economy. It could push us into overdrive, but it could also lead us to self-destruct."

One advantage that Ghana has over its oil-producing neighbours, said Mr Bentil, is experience and political stability. While countries such as Nigeria were already swimming in oil money at independence, Ghana has had 50 years to build up institutions to manage its finances.

It is also one of the few countries in the region to hold free and fair elections with peaceful transitions of power.

Although corruption at state level remains significant, accountability has improved greatly in recent years, donor officials say.

Mats Karlsson, the World Bank country director for Ghana, said that even without oil, Ghana was on track to become a middle-income country by 2015, when it would start to wean itself off aid. Oil revenues could accelerate that process.


"We have all seen how natural resources can ruin good performance in African countries," he said. "But there is reason to believe that Ghana will make the right decisions."

From riches to rags, to riches again
In 1957, when Ghana became the first former British colony to achieve independence in Africa, it had one of the continent's strongest economies. Within a decade however, the country had accumulated foreign debts of $1bn (£493m), and the economic slide was well under way. Political turmoil and a massive drop in both the price and production of cocoa - of which it is the world's second largest producer - saw the decline continue until the 1980s.

After a 1981 coup, the country's fourth in 15 years, Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings instituted a far-reaching economic recovery programme. Although the political instability and violence continued, the market-oriented plan worked, and Ghana has had enjoyed growth ever since. Under President John Kufuor, who beat Rawlings' handpicked successor in a peaceful 2000 election and won re-election four years later, there have been further economic reforms qualifying the country for massive debt relief. Many analysts now view Ghana as one of Africa's brightest prospects.

· This article was amended on Monday July 30 2007 and the correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and clarifications column on Tuesday July 31 2007. In the article above we mistakenly called Congo-Brazzaville the Democratic Republic of the Congo when they are two different countries. This has been corrected.

Via: The Guardian
by Xan Rice

Blogalaxia|マヌエル,エレルギ-ボルゴ, Ghana