The Malta Chamber was recently requested to contribute towards the post-pandemic strategy which is in development by government. Throughout the different phases of COVID-19, The Malta Chamber truly embodied its mission, to be the voice of business. We acted as a vehicle through which the business community was able to come together and establish a common, effective response to the crisis. This was embodied through numerous initiatives which have resulted in a wealth of policy documentation. These documents should now take centre-stage as our formal submission to the post-pandemic strategy.
The sixteen policy documents which The Malta Chamber has published since January 2020 are ultimately all connected to its Economic Vision 2020-2025, in which we call for "a smart, sustainable island". The Vision is holistic, highlighting the need for growth which respects quality of life. It addresses the needs of the country broadly, tackling the need to reengineer our education systems and structure, so as to reduce the gap between what is being produced through the system and what is needed by industry. Through this document, The Malta Chamber recognises that tourism needs to be about value added, not about ever-increasing tourist numbers, and that technology and innovation are crucial to a diverse and resilient economy.
These pillars have stood the test of time, as not even a global pandemic was able to make the message of the Economic Vision less relevant. On the contrary, the Vision is more relevant than ever before, and the importance of addressing the opportunities and challenges it identifies has only increased. With that having clearly been the case throughout the pandemic, the Vision served as a backdrop for the unrelenting efforts of The Malta Chamber's members and its staff as they worked together overtime to find solutions to the ever-growing challenges faced by private enterprise, who came together to propose 4 Stimulus Packages from March 2020 including contributions to the Regeneration Plan of 8th June 2020 titled ‘Making a Success of the New Norm’. These aimed to support SMEs with liquidity while aiming to use the pandemic as an opportunity for businesses to re-engineer themselves and change to grow, while adapting to the New Norm.
In the first months of the pandemic, stakeholder meetings were held with over 30 business sectors to draw policy recommendations and to communicate the urgent concerns of business leaders to government in a consolidated fashion. The Malta Chamber thus conducted a Think Tank exercise from June – July 2020. This exercise saw 150 CEOs coming together across 12 different business sectors to carry out an exercise in foresight, identifying the actions the country would need to take to emerge as strongly as possible from the pandemic. The employers put together hundreds of recommendations through the Policy Team within The Malta Chamber.
At the same time, The Malta Chamber was expanding its own internal capacity, recruiting new staff and establishing new horizontal thematic committees to develop policy in a number of areas. In turn, these teams of sectoral experts began to draft recommendations for government from their own specialised fields. The Malta Chamber’s consistent contributions towards national policy thus more than cover the 12 thematic areas identified for a post-pandemic strategy.
While many key policies of The Malta Chamber have already been adopted by government and endorsed by other stakeholders and social partners, there is still a long way to go. We set up the Moneyval Forum to provide advice to government on passing the assessment. However, we made it clear that passing the assessment should not be the end goal, but merely another step on a long journey towards higher standards. We thus included long-term measures, and similarly, The Malta Chamber will continue to push for a truly "smart, sustainable island" which respects Gozo's unique characteristics, educates our workforce for the economy of tomorrow, and truly ensures wellbeing for all.
Given the various successes working hand in hand with government and stakeholders to adopt much needed measures, The Malta Chamber looks to the future with confidence, though proportional to the extent to which this collaboration is deepened. The wealth of policy documentation The Malta Chamber is making available for the post-pandemic strategy therefore presents a unique opportunity to cover ground which is still very much needed by the country. In the meanwhile, The Malta Chamber will continue to act as the voice of business in Malta, engaging its members, staff and stakeholders alike to draft and petition in favour of the economy which Malta wants, needs and deserves.