In the Tuesday Night Symposium in Damascus, a well-known forum for critical discussion of economic issues, the lessons of the current five-year plan, the tenth, which is coming to the end of its cycle, were discussed and analyzed with an uncommon degree of transparency.
The main speaker at the symposium, Dr. Qadri Jamil, most likely an academic although his title was not given, analyzed the five-year plan's failure to achieve its key targets. On the issue of poverty, the plan called for reducing poverty by 20%-30%, but the "announced" reduction has been 10%.
Unemployment remained steady at 8%. The plan's target of creating 250,000 new jobs annually was not met. In fact, the results show the actual figure to be 25,000 new jobs.
Investment, both public and private, did not exceed 25% of gross domestic product. The real income of the majority of the population has declined. Expenditures on health and education were below the levels envisaged by the plan.
[There was no discussion about the country's foreign trade. Obviously, the low levels of investment might suggest that foreign direct investment in Syria has been below the plan targets, and indeed far below the rosy pictures often drawn by Syrian Economy Minister Abdallah Al-Dardari, whose ministry is responsible for drawing up the five-year plans. Freedom of discussion has its limits in Syria; hence, no one dared to blame Al-Dardari for the poor performance of the five-year plan which he had trumpeted with unfounded optimism.]
Source: Al-Thawra, Syria, March 11, 2010
