Peruvian president says world suffers from "growing pains"

Nov 22, 2008, 7:54 GMT

Lima - Peruvian President Alan Garcia on Friday defined the financial and economic crisis that is currently affecting the world as both a 'painful childbirth' and 'growing pains,' rather than an outright illness affecting global capitalism.

'This is a wealth crisis and a system expansion crisis and it should not be treated with statism or protectionism,' Garcia said in Lima, as he opened the CEO summit that precedes this weekend's APEC Leaders' Meeting.

'I claim that the world is not sick but is rather suffering from growing pains,' he said.

Garcia, a staunch advocate of free trade, insisted that trade liberalization is the best possible way forward even at a time of crisis.

He admitted that the world is undergoing 'a situation of uncertainty, doubts and even confusion.'

'The explosion of the financial and real estate crisis that now threatens to move onto the real and material sector of the economy is forcing governments into rushed meetings and economic officials into thinking up initiatives to face the situation,' he said.

Still, he warned the world away from overregulation and looked back on the growth of recent years.

'We have lived the first year-long chapters of a revolution that should last longer. The emergence of an extraordinary market in the world, different from the passive and liable market of the 1930s,' he said.

Garcia underlined Peru's growth - of 10.08 per cent in the first nine months of 2008 - and said the country would like 'to be a haven for the capital that escapes other countries in fear.'