*Perangkap Utang Sri Lanka?* Prof R Ramakumar, Tata Institute of Social Sciences berbagi: *Perangkap Utang Sri Lanka?*
Dari beberapa angka yang diberikan, jelas terlihat bahwa jebakan utang yang dialami Sri Lanka bukanlah pinjaman dari China. Pinjaman China hanya menyumbang 10% dari total utang Sri Lanka. Pinjaman Jepang ke Sri Lanka lebih besar dari China sebesar 11%. Mengapa tidak ada yang menyebutnya jebakan utang? Agenda nakal dari Amerika adalah alasannya. Mereka berbohong dan menyebarkan disinformasi untuk mencoreng China tanpa menyebutkan angka sebenarnya. Jika utang ke China hanya 10%, Jepang 11%, maka sebagian besar utang, jebakan utang nyata 79% berasal dari mana? Ini adalah IMF, kreditur terbesar Sri Lanka, organisasi yang menyebabkan semua kesengsaraan Sri Lanka. Ini adalah contoh sempurna lain dari orang Amerika yang berbahaya yang menuding, membuat tuduhan liar ketika mereka adalah pelaku sebenarnya. Jebakan utang Sri Lanka disebabkan oleh pinjaman dari IMF. Bagaimana dengan kebohongan terkenal jebakan utang yang disebabkan oleh Pelabuhan Hambantota? Ya, Sri Lanka mengambil pinjaman besar dari Bank Exim China dan tidak mampu membayar kembali pinjaman itu. Tapi Sri Lanka mengubahnya menjadi pendapatan dengan menyewakan pelabuhan ke China dan dibayar US$1,12 miliar untuk itu. Dimana hutangnya? Di mana jebakan utang ketika itu menjadi nilai tambah bagi Sri Lanka? Mengapa orang Amerika yang jahat masih menyebarkan kebohongan jebakan hutang ini karena pelabuhan? Mengapa Amerika tidak mengakui bahwa jebakan utang datang dari IMF, sebuah organisasi yang dikendalikan Amerika? Menyewakan pelabuhan ke China adalah bisnis yang menguntungkan seperti Djibouti yang menyewakan tanahnya kepada Amerika, dan beberapa negara lain sebagai pangkalan militer. Ini adalah bisnis murni, menghasilkan uang sewa. Apa yang salah dengan itu? Djibouti masih negara merdeka dan bangga akan hal itu, tidak seperti semi-koloni Kekaisaran Amerika, Jepang, Korea Selatan, dan Eropa, yang semuanya telah kehilangan kemerdekaan dan dikendalikan oleh Amerika dan harus menjadi tuan rumah pangkalan Amerika di negara mereka sendiri, tidak bisa mengatakan "Tidak" kepada Amerika, dan harus membayar kehadiran militer Amerika di tanah air mereka. Kapan media Amerika dan barat akan menghentikan berita palsu mereka tentang jebakan utang ini? Kapan semua media yang bermusuhan dan yang disebut jurnalis, reporter, analis berhenti mengolesi China dengan kebohongan jebakan utang palsu ini? Jika ada masalah jebakan utang yang nyata, tidak ada yang akan bergabung dengan BRI, seluruh Afrika tidak akan mengambil pinjaman dari China. Untungnya para pemimpin negara-negara ini tidak bodoh dan tidak akan dipimpin oleh hidung jahat Amerika dan Barat dengan kebohongan dan disinformasi menjijikkan mereka. Tidak ada jebakan hutang dari China, hanya kebohongan orang kulit putih. 21-04-2022 13:50 Bukan China, IMF Penyebab Utama Sri Lanka Jatuh Ke Krisis Ekonomi When will the Sri Lankans (and the IMF) ever learn? Probably the sad story of how the economy got where it is now is also, alas, the story of what comes next by R. Ramakumar April 14, 2022 Sri Lanka's president last week revoked a days-old state of emergency after huge public protests such as this one demanded he resign over the country's worst economic crisis in memory. Photo: Tasnim News The island nation of Sri Lanka is in the midst of one of the worst economic crises it’s ever seen. It has just defaulted on its foreign debts for the first time since its independence, and the country’s 22 million people are facing crippling 12-hour power cuts, and an extreme scarcity of food, fuel and other essential items such as medicines. Inflation is at an all-time high of 17.5%, with prices of food items such as a kilogram of rice soaring to 500 Sri Lankan rupees (A$2.10) when it would normally cost around 80 rupees (A$0.34). Amid shortages, one 400g packet of milk powder is reported to cost over 250 rupees (A$1.05), when it usually costs around 60 rupees (A$0.25). On April 1, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa declared a state of emergency. In less than a week, he withdrew it following massive protests by angry citizens over the government’s handling of the crisis. The country relies on the import of many essential items including petrol, food items and medicines. Most countries will keep foreign currencies on hand in order to trade for these items, but a shortage of foreign exchange in Sri Lanka is being blamed for the sky-high prices. Why are some people blaming China? Many believe Sri Lanka’s economic relations with China are a main driver behind the crisis. The United States has called this phenomenon “debt-trap diplomacy.” This is where a creditor country or institution lends to a borrowing nation to increase the lender’s political leverage. If the borrower extends itself and cannot pay the money back, it is at the creditor’s mercy. However, loans from China accounted for only about 10% of Sri Lanka’s total foreign debt in 2020. The largest portion – about 30% – can be attributed to international sovereign bonds. Japan actually accounts for a higher proportion of its foreign debt, at 11%. Defaults over China’s infrastructure-related loans to Sri Lanka, especially the financing of the Hambantota port, are being cited as factors contributing to the crisis. The port at Hambantota in Sri Lanka. A Chinese company is running what was a white elephant. Photo: AFP / Lakruwan Wanniarachchi But these facts don’t add up. The construction of the Hambantota port was financed by the Chinese Exim Bank. The port was running losses, so Sri Lanka leased out the port for 99 years to the Chinese Merchant’s Group, which paid Sri Lanka US$1.12 billion. So the Hambantota port fiasco did not lead to a balance of payments crisis (where more funds or exports are going out than coming in); it actually bolstered Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves by US$1.12 billion. So what are the real reasons for the crisis? Post-independence from the British in 1948, Sri Lanka’s agriculture was dominated by export-oriented crops such as tea, coffee, rubber and spices. A large share of its gross domestic product came from the foreign exchange earned from exporting these crops. That money was used to import essential food items. Over the years, the country also began exporting garments, and earning foreign exchange from tourism and remittances (money sent into Sri Lanka from abroad, perhaps by family members). Any decline in exports would come as an economic shock, and put foreign exchange reserves under strain. For this reason, Sri Lanka frequently encountered balance of payments crises. From 1965 onwards, it obtained 16 loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Each of those loans came with conditions including that once Sri Lanka received the loan it had to reduce its budget deficit, maintain a tight monetary policy, cut government subsidies for food for the people of Sri Lanka, and depreciate the currency (so exports would become more viable). The seal of the International Monetary Fund is seen outside the headquarters building in Washington, DC, last year. Photo: AFP / Mandel Ngan But usually in periods of economic downturns, good fiscal policy dictates governments should spend more to inject stimulus into the economy. This becomes impossible with the IMF conditions. Despite this situation, the IMF loans kept coming, and a beleaguered economy soaked up more and more debt. The last IMF loan to Sri Lanka was in 2016. The country received US$1.5 billion for three years from 2016 to 2019. The conditions were familiar, and the economy’s health nosedived over this period. Growth, investments, savings and revenues fell, while the debt burden rose. A bad situation turned worse with two economic shocks in 2019. First, there was a series of bomb blasts in churches and luxury hotels in Colombo in April 2019. The blasts led to a steep decline in tourist arrivals – [url=https://www.businessinsider.com/lonely-planets-top-destination-suffers-a-blow-after-blasts-2019-5#:%7E:text=Sri%20Lanka%2C%20Lonely%20Planet's%20best,killed%20more%20than%20250%20people]with some reports stating up to an 80% drop[/url] – and drained foreign exchange reserves. Second, the new government under President Gotabaya Rajapaksa irrationally cut taxes. Sri Lanka’s then-new President Gotabaya Rajapaksa (R) and his Prime Minister brother Mahinda Rajapaksa, former president, pose for a group photograph after the ministerial swearing-in ceremony in Colombo on November 22, 2019. Photo: AFP / Ishara S. Kodikara Value-added tax rates (akin to some nations’ goods and services taxes) were cut from 15% to 8%. Other indirect taxes such as the nation-building tax, the pay-as-you-earn tax and economic service charges were abolished. Corporate tax rates were reduced from 28% to 24%. About 2% of the gross domestic product was lost in revenues because of these tax cuts. In March 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic struck. In April 2021, the Rajapaksa government made another fatal mistake. To prevent the drain of foreign exchange reserves, all fertilizer imports were completely banned. Sri Lanka was declared a 100% organic farming nation. This policy, which was withdrawn in November 2021, led to a drastic fall in agricultural production and more imports became necessary. But foreign exchange reserves remained under strain. A fall in the productivity of tea and rubber due to the ban on fertilizer also led to lower export incomes. Due to lower export incomes, there was less money available to import food and food shortages arose. Because there is less food and there are fewer other items to buy, but no decrease in demand, the prices for these goods rise. In February 2022, inflation rose to 17.5%. What will happen now? In all probability, Sri Lanka will now obtain a 17th IMF loan to tide over the present crisis, which will come with fresh conditions. A deflationary fiscal policy will be followed, which will further limit the prospects of economic revival and exacerbate the sufferings of the Sri Lankan people. R. Ramakumar is a professor of economics at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. https://asiatimes.com/2022/04/when-w...mf-ever-learn/ Debt trap cuma hoax buatan amerika dan india. Hutang Sri Lanka Ke China sudah selesai, sudah ditukar dengan menyewakan port ke China untuk imbalan 1, 12 milyar dollar. Jadi bukan saja Sri Lanka sudah bebas dari hutang, malah kas bertambah dengan1 milyar dollar lebih. Malah hutang Sri Lanka ke Jepang lebih besar. Juga IMF yg terus memberikan pinjaman ke Sri Lanka tapi melarang Sri Lanka untuk membangun infrastruktur sehingga roda ekonomi tersendat sendat dan membuat Sri Lanka tak bisa bayar hutang ke IMF. Itulah jerat debt trap sesungguhnya. -- Anda menerima pesan ini karena Anda berlangganan grup "GELORA45" dari Google Grup. Untuk berhenti berlangganan dan berhenti menerima email dari grup ini, kirim email ke [email protected]. 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