Czech economy will take 3 years to recover

The chairman of the supervisory board at ČSOB Zdeněk Tůma says the Czech economy will take three years to recover from the current recession it has fallen into, while it will take the countries in western Europe just two years. "The difference is that the developed nations which are relatively wealthy are able to make very strong budgetary impulses with free exchange policies," he said. The richer countries are simply able to invest more to help their economies push off from the bottom, said Tůma on Czech Television's Sunday morning news program. He said that in terms of building consumer confidence, this autumn would be crucial, because only then would it be clear which companies can survive and how the employment figures will likely develop. The other guest on the show was the chairman of the board at Komeční banka Jan Juchelka, who said that the ability of Czech exporters to reestablish their position on foreign markets. "For this, it will depend on the stimulus Germany and other European countries give their economies because they are our primary export markets," he said. Czech Television notes that Czech inflation is the highest in the European Union, with the price of food and non-alcoholic beverages having risen rapidly during April: fruit prices are 25 percent higher, vegetables are up 12 percent and pork jumped 19 percent. Juchelka blamed this on wages, which were still rising rapidly in February. Neither guest expected inflationary pressures to continue for long, or that they could spiral out of control.