Foreign Minister Ingibjörg Sólrún Gísladóttir will give a speech on Iceland’s economy to Danish businessmen and reporters in Copenhagen today, while Prime Minister Geir H. Haarde will host a press breakfast on the same topic in New York on Thursday.
Haarde, who is also an economist, will brief the media on the state of Iceland’s economy in relation to global developments. A Q&A session will follow. The briefing is part of the annual conference of the Icelandic-American Chamber of Commerce (IACC).
Gísladóttir’s presentation is organized by the Iceland Chamber of Commerce, Iceland’s Embassy in Copenhagen and the Danish Chamber of Commerce. Nearly 200 representatives of Danish companies, banks and media outlets are expected to attend, as Vidskiptabladid reports.
“The meeting is open and it is supposed to indicate that we are willing to discuss things,” said Rósa Vidarsdóttir, a commercial attaché at the Icelandic Embassy in Copenhagen.
Vidarsdóttir added that there have been many negative reports about the Icelandic economy in Denmark and Danes have expressed their discontent with Icelanders not being informative enough on economic issues. Today’s meeting is supposed to improve that, she said.
Apart from Gísladóttir, chairman of Kaupthing Bank’s board Sigurdur Einarsson, Professor at London School of Economics Richard Portes and Icelandic film producer Sigurjón Sighvatsson will speak during the meeting. It takes place at the SAS hotel in Amager.
Heavy-weights in the Icelandic economy and international financial experts will also join Prime Minister Haarde at the conference in New York on Thursday, including CEOs of Iceland’s thee largest commercial banks, Executive Chairman of Baugur Group Jón Ásgeir Jóhannesson, Professor at Harvard Business School Gregory Miller and Senior Economist of Global Economics at Deutsche Bank Securities Torsten Slok.
According to an IACC press release, despite the current global economic climate, Iceland remains steady on the economic path of liberalization, privatization and globalization that have been the underlying themes of Icelandic government policies for almost 20 years.
The country has access to and expertise in some of the “hot” resources of the 21st century – an abundance of clean geothermal and hydro energy, pure drinking water and carefully managed fish stocks, IACC states.
