Desarrollo energético en América Latina y la economía mundial

William Loehr I POST 1973 ADJUSTMENT PROBLEMS OF OIL-IMPORTING... In group 2, El Salvador was bearing no greater debt service burden in 1977 than in 1970. While debt service increased somewhat in Honduras by 1977, the ratio of debt service to exports remains low. The problem country is Peru, where the debt service burden was more than 2,5 times its 1970 level. But, we must note that Peru's debt service burden increased before the major oil price hikes, and has remained high, and at about the same level throughout the 1973- 77 periodo Chile is the country of primary concern in group 3, since debt service tripled in the 1973-77 periodo Panama and Uruguay both carried relatively high debt service in 1977, but in each case the increases since 1973 were moderate and in the Uruguayan case, a high debt service burden can be traced back to at least 1970. The region's poorest performers on economic growth during the 1973-77 period, were Argentina, Chile, Peru and Panama. Data are shown in tabIe 5, where growth in GDP and exports are adjusted for price changes. In each of these cases, the economies concerned where rather stagnant, but in the rest of the region, countries continued to grow at rates which were either aboye their average for the prece– ding decade (4 cases) or where declines were evident, they were to levels hígh historicaIly for developing countries. Excepting the coun. tries mentioned the regíon grew at an (unweighted) average rate of 5.5%. Sustained growth through the 1970's, despite petroleum price prob– lems has been noted by Massad (1979) with the additional obser– vatíon that non-petroleum exporting Latin American countries grew considerably faster than the OECD countries as a group. This fact pre– sents the greatest problem in assessing the impact of increased petro. leum prices on developing countries. It is well known that the busi· ness cycIe in LDCs follows that in DCs (see for example Hargreaves. Heap 1979). The world-wide recession of 1974-75, should have been expected to affect negatively, incorlles in LDCs,since demand for the latter's exports depend upon income levels in advanced countries. To continue to grow, while the developed world contracts, implies for LDC's a great need to import capital and to be particulaly aggresive in export expansion·. The problem is compounded by the sudden price increase of any import commodity whose price elasticity of demand is low and which is a large share of total trade, 5uch as petroleum. ·Under «he circum.stances one might better say 10 prevent export contracdon. 227.