Panama’s ‘$100 for 70’ Program
One of President Martinelli’s first acts when he was inaugurated was to pass a law termed the “$100 for 70” program. In short the program provided a monthly pension of $100 for all Panamanians 70 and older who had no other form of income. This week thousands of seniors received the last payment of 2011. The government pays these checks quarterly, so the checks are for about $300 dollars each. And keep in mind that married seniors receive two checks.
One of the maids in the hotel told me about the impact this program had on her parents. Her 84-year old father worked his entire life (and raised a family) working at what we would refer to as ‘odd jobs’. They lived off the family garden and what he was paid, often in barter – staples of rice, flour, etc. Needless to say he had no retirement plan. And when her parents received their first checks, that $600 was at least twice the total amount of cash money that had ever passed through her father’s hands in an entire year! Her mother was initially afraid to go home with that much money, and ended up counting and recounting it for weeks.
This program is tax dollars going straight into the hands of exceptionally poor senior citizens, and they then immediately turn right around and spend every dime of it on the local economy. Mostly on food. (By the way, who do you think this woman in the photo is going to vote for in 2014?)
Panama also has another pay oddity that spreads some Christmas cheer. Employees in Panama receive an extra monthly payment in December called the "13th month". Sort of bonus payment employers are required to pay their employees. These monies are also injected into the economy in the weeks preceding Christmas.
Ho..ho..ho…..
Weather Warnings
Weather forecasters are saying that our ‘wet season’ here in Panama may be extended this year through December and well into January due to a variety of weather factors involving weather fronts and ocean currents. That is not good news for those of us in Panama where the ‘dry season’ runs roughly from mid-December through early April. That is our summer – school is out and travel and outdoor activities are planned well in advance without a second thought given to the weather. And this forecast also causes us to all look back at the unusual occurrences around the same time last year.
The rains that fell between 7 - 9 December 2010 caused more than 500 landslides in the upper reservoir of Lake Alajuela, in the watershed of the Panama Canal. The historic amounts of rainfall caused the Panama Canal to be closed for 17 hours - only the fourth suspension of canal traffic in history. In addition it significantly affected the supply of drinking water being produced by the Federico Guardia Conte water purification plant in Chilibre. There are still some lingering affects on the water supply systems in and around Panama City.
Reports from the Management of Water Resources of the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) state a significant number of mudslides occurred in the area of the Lake Alajuela during those days. Using "geo referenced" images to identify and count the exact number of landslides, photographically they have identified more than 500 mudslides. This means that in just those 3 days there were more mudslides than what had occurred in the previous ten years, combined. Those mudslides also denuded a lot of those hills, leaving them barren instead of heavily forested.
Don Winters (Panama Guide) added, “More than 500 mudslides in just three days? More than in all of the past ten years combined? No wonder the water treatment plant at Chilibre was overwhelmed.” And remember, those "scars" are still exposed to the elements. Heavy rains will wash more sediment into the lake from those exposed areas, causing "turbidity" in the raw source water.”
Coffee From Boquete, Panama
Some of the best coffee in the world comes from Boquete, the mountain village just up the road from David. I drink Boquete coffee and it is outstanding. And based on the astronomical prices paid ($125+ per pound) for award winning Boquete coffees in coffee shows in Paris, and big sales to Japanese buyers, there are a lot of people who agree with my humble assessment. (No, I don’t normally drink the $100/lb. version).
Lee Zeltzer explains in a recent blog posting (Boquete Guide) that the local coffee industry is facing tough times, and it appears things will only get worse for the coffee farmers. Panama’s growth, particularly in Boquete, has pushed land prices up to the point that land is becoming too expensive for coffee farmers to operate as a profitable business. He notes, for example, that the big luxury resort, Valle Escondido, is a former coffee farm.
Lee does see a glimmer of hope however. He says, “There is one saving grace, a small one for Boquete. We have world class coffee and we have crazy expats here who are willing to grow it at a loss. …. There are many small growers in Boquete, some have figured out how to make a business selling coffee and I have helped to develop a small online business selling coffee for some of them. The way we can maintain coffee as a business in Boquete is to help the coffee drinker realize we have the best they can buy. In addition buying our coffee helps feed the many indigenous people who live here and earn their daily bread picking coffee.”
You can read Lee’s article in full by clicking on this link:
You can also shop for and purchase coffee from Boquete using this link. Note that the prices include shipping.
Unemployment? What Unemployment?
Unemployment in Panama fell to 4.5% in August 2011, a decrease of one percentage point compared to the most recent measurement of 5.6% in March of this year. The report notes that in rural areas the unemployment rate fell from 3.9% to 2.4%, and in urban areas unemployment fell from 6.4% to 5.4%. The August 2011 unemployment rate is the lowest in at least the last four decades - the lowest in modern recorded history. And Panama's economy keeps chugging along, growing at a rate of 8.5% this year, so even more jobs are being created.
Don Winters (Panama Guide) Comments (edited): …Panama has already reached a "practical level of zero unemployment," meaning that there are many more jobs available than there are people to fill them. These people who are currently unemployed are basically unemployable ….. Either they have little or no formal education (they didn't finish school or are functionally illiterate), they have some kind of addiction problems, or have a long criminal record. On the other hand, salaries for those people with highly sought after skill sets are quickly rising as employers face more and stiffer competition to find and retain valuable employees. A smart, educated, bilingual manager who is capable of handling almost any situation can practically name their price. The government of Panama is now scraping the bottom of the barrel so to speak, and twisting people's arms to get them to attend some kind of training class to improve their hire-ability. … Sooner or later Panama will be forced to (gently) allow foreigners to come here to work, or risk slowing the economic engine due to a lack of skilled manpower. This unemployment rate of 4.5% is
The Gospel According To Matthews
My thought for the day.
NEVER DO ANYTHING YOU WOULD NOT WANT TO
HAVE TO EXPLAIN TO THE PARAMEDICS
A Scandal A Day Keeps….
A scandal a day keeps us from getting bored down here in Panama. Meet César Segura – who now is the most famous florist in Panama. He recently went to the offices of the Attorney General to be interrogated in the case (scandal) of a parcel of land in Paitilla, and he left that evening in handcuffs. Land scandals are all too common here, and can get very involved and complicated. So I will try to keep this explanation simple.
Like most of the countries in this part of the world, the concept of having ‘title to your land’ is a relatively new concept. Family farms and residences, for instance, passed down from generation to generation. In many cases the land was even parceled up to accommodate the family generations. But regardless of the improvements, or houses on the land, the owners did not have title to the land (it belonged to the government), but they occupied it legally by ‘Right of Possession’ (ROP) – in the simplest cases, they had occupied it forever.
Obviously the ROP approach did not mesh very well with modern realities and created a lot of problems. Foreigners and retirees would come to Panama and buy a home and ‘discover’ later that they did not own the land. They would usually discover that when they went to sell it, and a knowledgeable prospective buyer would balk because the land was not titled. There were also many instances where some unscrupulous types would claim the homeowner had no ROP (they weren’t even Panamanian), and toss them off the land by claiming that they (the crooks) had ROP because they lived in that house when they were a kid (or some such reason).
You can also see that this ROP approach would not work for a developer or someone who wanted to build a resort or a big hotel. So the central government of Panama started exercising its power to grant public lands to private individuals or companies. If you had been occupying land and had a "right of possession" then you can apply for a title. Once you are given a title, then the land is no longer owned by the state, and is now legally and officially yours to do with as you chose.
You don’t have to be too familiar with the way things work in Panama to realize this titling process was, and is, ripe for corruption. So the government established a new agency to manage the granting of land titles, the National Land Authority (ANATI). In recent weeks there have been two scandals involving the granting of land titles by the ANATI and specifically with Anabelle Villamonte, the woman who was in charge of the office. The case of César Segura – the now famous florist – is one of them.
Senor Segura ceded a parcel of land worth an estimated $4 million dollars in Paitilla - free of charge. The first irregularity that attracted attention was that Villamonte personally approved the transfer in a matter of days, not the normal 3-4 months normally associated with these ANATI transactions. Then it was revealed that a group of buyers were ready to take the land off Segura’s hands due to an agreement that had been negotiated well before the titling. It really got sticky when it came to light that the lawyer who had spent months putting this real estate deal together was Senora Anabelle Villamonte herself, in her capacity as a lawyer prior to taking over as head of ANATI. The wheels totally came off the cart when questions came up about whether Segura even qualified for ROP status. And it went of a cliff when there were claims that the parcel of land was worth well in excess of the publicized $4 million and that there were people living on portions of the land that did in fact have ROP of their portion of the plot.
Like most of these big corruption cases, Segura’s position at the bottom of the pyramid in this caper makes him the ‘shmuck’ so he is in handcuffs headed to jail. And Anabelle Villamonte? They are starting an investigation. The chances of her doing any jail time vary from zero to ‘you gotta be kidding’. The only thing we can be sure of is that the lid is off. There will be many more of these shady deals (which are pretty much common knowledge) that will suddenly be ‘discovered’.
My Book – ‘Angels in Panama’
My book is still available at a reasonable price paperback from the publisher.
The book is also now (finally!) available in e-book form as well from both Amazon (for the Kindle) and Barnes & Noble (the Nook).
A great Christmas gift idea - at least I think so.
The links below are for the various formats of my book. I have also included a link to my website where you can read excerpts of ‘Angels in Panama’ if you want.
Paperback from Publisher $9.95
Till Next Time. Pura Vida
Holiday celebrations (click on thumbnail to view photo full-size)
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