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Issue 28 | Spring 2009

Click on the articles below for highlights of this issue, or
use the ‘PDF download’ tool to see the whole magazine.

Article 1

THE VIEW
FROM HERE

Article 2

10 QUESTIONS FOR: BRIAN LISTER

Article 3

COVER STORY: DIRECTING DEVELOPMENTS

Professor Donald MacRae, Lloyds TSB Scotland, identifies enduring strengths amidst today’s turbulent markets

Hindsight is more accurate but prediction is more interesting” is the warning quotation for any economist wishing to project, forecast, estimate or even guess the future of the global economy. It is many years since the world experienced such a fast and furious decline in business and consumer confidence. The International Monetary Fund predicted in March that the global economy will shrink by between 0.5% and 1.0% this year – the first global contraction in 60 years.

Scotland’s latest annual underlying growth rate was 1.4%, but with an ominous fall of 0.8% in quarter 3 of last year. Scotland is now firmly in recession, joining Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, the USA and the rest of the UK. The latest Fraser of Allander Institute forecast for the Scottish economy in 2009 is a decline of 2.6%. Their worse scenario projection is a decline of 3.1%.

Consumer optimism has fallen to the lowest level in 20 years. While Scottish house prices have not declined to anything like the same degree as other parts of the UK, the number of housing transactions (purchases and sales) has at least halved compared to last year.

Just under half (47%) of the businesses reporting in the latest Lloyds TSB Scotland Business Monitor were expecting a decline in turnover in the next six months compared to only 19% expecting an increase. However, Scottish retail sales in February 2009 increased annually by 2.7%, indicating that the Scottish consumer may not have lost all confidence.

page 1 | 2

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Also in this issue:
>	Business funding for SMEs and start up companies: what’s out there?
>	New ‘one-stop-shop’ for Edinburgh’s development industry
>	Edinburgh’s write stuff – the power of the written word